The Paramount; designed in Art Deco style by the architect S. J. Young (??? Y谩ng Ximi霉; 1899-1978) was completed in 1933; by a group of Chinese bankers. It lay just off Bubbling Well Road (now Nanjing West Road); a major entertainment thoroughfare and was a meeting place for the wealthy elite of Shanghai society. The Ballroom lasted under its original owners before going bankrupt in 1936. In 1937; it was converted into a taxi dance hall featuring Chinese dance hostesses; which it remained until 1949.

Shanghai began life as a fishing village; and later as a port receiving goods carried down the Yangzi River. From 1842 onwards; in the aftermath of the first Opium War; the British opened a 鈥榗oncession' in Shanghai where drug dealers and other traders could operate undisturbed. French; Italians; Germans; Americans and Japanese all followed. By the 1920s and 1930s; Shanghai was a boom town and an international byword for dissipation. When the Communists won power in 1949; they transformed Shanghai into a model of the Revolution.