The defining character of Moganshan is its colonial-era architecture: over 200 stone villas built by foreign missionaries, merchants, and diplomats from the 1890s onward who sought relief from Shanghai's summer heat on this cool forested ridge. The buildings use local granite and tile in a hybrid style that blends Arts and Crafts English country house with Chinese hill-station practicality — deep verandas, solid walls, steep rooflines to shed the heavy fog-rain. Many survive in good condition and have been converted into boutique hotels and guesthouses.
The villas are scattered across the hillside without a formal museum district, which means exploring them involves wandering lanes and peering through garden gates. Several are marked with plaques identifying their historical occupants. The density of the surviving buildings and the quality of the stonework give the mountain a distinctly un-Chinese atmosphere — more Shimla or Baguio than Zhejiang — and this contrast with the bamboo forest immediately outside is one of Moganshan's persistent pleasures.