The Main Building is the oldest structure in the University of Hong Kong. It was a gift from Sir H N Mody and was designed by Alfred Bryer of Messrs Leigh & Orange. Construction began in 1910 and was completed in 1912. The building, composed in the beginning of two courtyards with plam trees now over thirty feet high, was conceived in the Post-Renaissance Style which employed giant (2-storeyed) Ionic orders and Serliana windows in the then prevalent red brick and grantie construction. The main elevation in the north is articulated by four turrets on the roof with a central clock tower - a gift from Sir Paul Chater in 1930 - over the entrance of a porte-cochere.

The building was extended in 1952 by completing two more courtyards in the southern half and in 1958 by adding one floor in the end block, all done in the same style and materials. It was originally used as classrooms and laboratories for Medicine and Engineering and is now home of the various departments within the Arts Faculty.

The central Great Hall which can seat about 450 people is named after Loke Yew of Kuala Lumpur, a benefactor of the University in its early years. The Main Building, being the symbolic structure of one of the oldest universities of western tradition in the Far East, was declared an historic monument in 1983 by the Hong Kong Government.