Pudu Prison Gate

Preserved gate of former Pudu Jail, once Southeast Asia's largest prison, now a heritage landmark

All that remains of Pudu Prison, the colonial-era jail that stood on this site from 1895 to 2010. The arched red-brick gatehouse with its clock and faded inscriptions survives as a heritage island, awkwardly embedded in the edge of the new Lalaport shopping mall, and is one of the few visible reminders in this part of the city that KL existed before the towers went up.

The site is best as a five-minute curiosity stop combined with a walk through the surrounding Bukit Bintang neighbourhood. Plaques explain the prison's history — Japanese internees during the war, the colourful prisoner-painted mural that ran along the outer wall, and the long campaign by Malaysian heritage activists that saved at least this much.

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When the rest of the prison was demolished in 2010 to make way for the Bukit Bintang City Centre development, the original Edwardian gatehouse and a long stretch of the perimeter wall were left standing as a heritage protest. Inside, prisoners had painted a continuous mural — the world's longest at over 800 metres — that was lost in the demolition.

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