In the post-war era, under the leadership of Shaw Run-de, Shaw’s HK studio went through a re-organization. For instance, in 1952, Nanyang Film Company was restructured to become Shaw & Sons Ltd., and “Nanyang Studios” was renamed “Shaw Studios”. After the restructuring, Shaw’s main policy also changed from focusing on the making of Cantonese films to the making of Mandarin films. After the war, as Hong Kong’s film business revived, and as many film personalities from Shanghai started to migrate southward to Hong Kong, the local film production industry began to heat up gradually. Given the circumstances, Shaw & Sons had quite a lot of competitors. The two big film companies - Motion Picture & General Investment Co. Ltd. and Great Wall Movie Enterprise Limited – were the more well-known ones. Shaw’s film production business in Hong Kong was indeed brewing a radical change.

In 1958, Shaw Run-run relocated his base and moved from Singapore to settle in Hong Kong in preparation for his plan to expand the film production business in Hong Kong. He first established Shaw Brothers (Hong Kong) Limited, then purchased a site in Clearwater Bay to build Shaw Studios. He focused on making more films to increase and stabilize film supply, which in turn would support the group’s large-scale film circuits.

In late 1961, Shaw’s Film Studio in Clearwater Bay was officially opened after many years of construction. It occupied a land of about 650,000 square feet, and was equipped with state-of-the-art facilities and encompassed a number of big filming studios. It also incorporated the large-scale Hollywood studio system and implemented the streamline production system. To facilitate the filming of period drama films, a “Period Costume Street” was built inside the studio. Shaw’s official magazine, “Southern Screen”, gave an account of the condition at the time, “Having invested HK$1,000,000 and 3 years in the building, the first phase of construction is completed, and Shaw studios in Clearwater Bay was officially opened on 10 November - This is a new studio that outshines the others in the whole Asian region. It occupies a land of about 650,000 square feet and on its ground 18 structures, including 6 filming studios, comprehensive production facilities such as dubbing, screening, sound recording, film processing and printing facilities, and the staff quarters in villa-style buildings. As the facilities…for widescreen Shawscope and color films filming, a better result can be achieved.” With regards to the filming area for period dramas, it was written in the article that “the studio has built a series of fixed and permanent settings for various time-periods and various geographical areas, so that there is something appropriate for every time-period and every geographical area so that no rebuilding of new sets is necessary. This facility helps to save the production time and offers the advantage of more realistic and authentic sets than temporary sets. And it was not available in the other studios in the past.” The article also stated that the birth of Shaw Studios would bring about radical changes to the film industry in Hong Kong, “very shortly, Clearwater Bay will become the film city of the Far East. It is estimated that…when all facilities are operational, the total production volume of Hong Kong films will rise by over 30%.”