This set of four successive maps aims to trace time variations in the distribution of the recorded advertising population in Shanghai foreign settlements between 1905-1943. These maps have been drawn after the Shanghai Municipal Archives (essentially based on the two major census of advertising hoardings in the International settlement in 1914 and 1943).

We shall insist on the fact that these maps reflect the recorded rather than actual advertising population in Shanghai. More precisely, the concentration of advertisements in the Northern District before 1919 reflects a documentary bias resulting from the major inventory of advertising hoardings owned by the Oriental Advertising Agency in this district in 1914. The scattered population between 1919-1929 reflects the fragmented documentation on which this map is based during this period of time. The ginning of advertisements along Avenue Joffre in 1930-1937 mirrors the regular records of Claude Neon Lights' signs in the French Concession, which constitutes the bulk of our documentation at the time. The extensive census of advertising hoardings conducted in the International Settlement in 1943 eventually explains the overwhelming population in this settlement at the end of the period.

Despite the documentary bias, these maps reveals some permanent patterns of localization: the clustering of advertisements in the International Settlement (Northern District, Central District along Nanking Road, Western District aroud the Race Course and Bubbling Well Road) and along Avenue Joffre in the French Concession.