In the first half of the 20th century, Xiong Kewu, a veteran of the Kuomintang, lived there. Next to his residence was the famous Chengdu Grand Theater and the Rong Paradise Restaurant, known as the signature restaurant of time-honored Sichuan cuisine.

In the 1950s, it became the seat of the Sichuan Federation of Literary and Art Circles and its affiliated provincial writers, artists, musician associations and the editorial department of the well-known Stars poetry magazine.

Sichuan's nationally acclaimed writers, such as Sha Ting, Ai Wu, Sun Jingxuan and Zhou Keqin worked and lived there for a long time, said Yu Xuntan, an 88-year-old poet and writer.

With an area of 1,000 square meters, the site had been the three-storey canteen of Sichuan Daily for about 20 years when Liu was asked by the newspaper to design it into a combination of tradition and modernity in 2015.

"Soon after I got the task, I ended up on a trip to Europe for more than 20 days. During the trip, I was thinking of the design all the time," Liu said.