Sam Kee Building

About

The Sam Kee Building (Chinese: 三記號大樓), also known as the Jack Chow Insurance Building, is a two-storey commercial building in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, located near the entrance to the city's Chinatown. It is noted for its narrow depth, which varies by floor. The ground floor is 4 feet 11 inches (1.50 m) wide, while the upper floor spans 6 feet (1.8 m) because of its overhanging bay windows. Additionally, a basement extends under the sidewalk adjacent to the storefront. This discrepancy has led to a dispute with the Skinny Building in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, over which commercial building is more narrow, as the Skinny Building has a consistent depth of 5 feet 2 inches (1.57 m). Nonetheless, the Sam Kee Building is recognized by Guinness World Records as the narrowest commercial building in the world and by Ripley's Believe It or Not! as the world's thinnest building.

The building was constructed as a spite house in 1913, in defiance of Vancouver City Council's decision to expropriate without compensation a lot belonging to local business magnate Chang Toy, also known as "Sam Kee". Located at the corner of Carrall Street and Pender Street, the depth of the original lot was reduced from roughly 30 feet (9.1 m) to 6 feet (1.8 m) for the widening of the latter street. Chang bet a business associate that he could construct a building on the land that remained and the Sam Kee Building was completed a year later. It originally consisted of a ground floor housing retail shops, an upper floor housing residential and organizational units, and a basement containing public baths.