Chinese summer palace

Chinese summer palace

The summer palace is located in the west of Beijing, first in the Chinese ancient gardens ,one of the largest imperial gardens in the world with the total area of 290 hectares. It has a history of more than 800 years. Early in the Jin dynasty, an imperial palace named Golden Hill Palace was built on the present site. In 1750, Emperor Qian Long of the Qing Dynasty built the Garden of Clear Ripples here and renamed the hill Longevity Hill to celebrate his mother’s birthday. The garden is mainly made up of the Kunming Lake and the Longevity Hill. The Kunming Lake takes up three quarters of the garden. The lake and the hill are linked by a long covered passageway of 728 meters. It is made up of yellow and blue tiles and vermillion pillars. On the ceilings are more than 14000 colored paintings. Many of which are about the sceneries of Hangzhou, as the royal families were all fond of the beautiful landscape of the city. The garden can be divided into three parts: administrative area, residence and scenery browsing area. The administrative area has the Hall of Benevolence and Longevity as its principal part. It is the place where Cixi dealt with state affairs and received officials. The residential are mainly consists of hall of Jade Billows, Garden of Virtue and Harmony, and Hall of Joyful Longevity . The Kunming Lake and the Longevity Hill then serve as the scenery browsing area. Here you can see the magnificent Seventeen-Arch Bridge.

The summer palace absorbed the architectural essence of all places in China. The palace area and living area is typical courtyard-style of the north. The lake area in the south is typical West lake-style of Hnagzhou. The north side of teh Longevity Hill is typical Tibetan temples with white pagodas and bunkers. There are interweaved shops on Suzhou street in the north , typical water village style.