Cathay Cathay Cathay () is an alternative historical name for China in English. During the early modern period Europeans thought of "Cathay" as a completely separate and distinct culture from China. As knowledge of East Asia increased, Cathay came to be seen as the same nation as China and the term '"Cathay" became a poetic name for the nation. The name "Cathay" originates from the word Khitan (), the name of a nomadic people who founded the Liao Empire which ruled much of today's Northern China from 907 to 1125, and who later migrated west after they were overthrown by the
Cathay Building the whole complex. Cathay Building and the Picturehouse would showed its last movie in 2000 before closing for redevelopment. The front facade of its theatre building structure was gazetted as a national monument for conservation on 10 February 2003, while the rest of the building structure was later demolished. Thus the new building incorporated conservation of the original art-deco façade of the 1939 and combined together with a modern-day design by Paul Tange of Tange Associates Japan and RDC Architects Pte Ltd Singapore. The Cathay as it is currently known, was opened on 24 March 2006. The building houses retail,