A Study On The Design Theories And Approaches Of The Private Gardens Of Yangzhou City In Late Qing Dynasty

There are two clusters of historical remains of Yangzhou garden existed today. The cluster of public gardens that scattered around the Slender West Lake located in the northwest of the town were constructed during period of 1661 to 1796, most of its original built up structures were destroyed and had rebuit only in recent years. The other cluster of private gardens located in the inner city are largely intact, they were constructed during the Daoguang era (1820-1840) with continual maintenance, renovations and expansion until the period to early Republican era. According to principle of authenticity of physical evidence for the research, the well protected private gardens in the inner city are the research objects for the purpose of this paper.This research will mainly focus on the following:First, the subject of the inner city private gardens built over the period of late Qing dynasty to early Republican era including Ge Garden, He Garden, XiaoPanGu, Wang’s Garden, YiPu, Jia’s Garden (The pavilion with two thirds of noon), Di Garden and Gourd garden of which sites are remapped, assessed, analyzed and noted with its historical significance. Second, the research attempts to construct a theoretic framework of philosophical principles of Yangzhou private garden by applying methodology from the hand book of ’Yuan ye’to deconstruct the garden’s physical elements and metaphorical formations of the spaces. Third, with thorough case study and applying the phenomenological hermeneutics research methodology that taking the phenomenon into historic context, the research explores the dynamic relation between the gardens’evolutions and the history of the original owners’ complex social networks and their families, hence, draw a clearer picture of the Yangzhou private gardens which can be drawn from varies aspects.The prosperity of Yangzhou in late Qing dynasty was largely resulted from the economic vibrancy of the Grant Canal which supported by a series reforms of salt policies. Such economical prosperous permeated into a much broader culture spectrum which includes education, fine arts and craftsmanship that directly contributed to the construction of the private gardens in two major precincts of the city and its unique garden style formation that became the last chapter of traditional garden flourish. During the era, Yangzhou’s urban landscape and garden characteristics generally featured the compact layouts of structures such as hall of boat, reading loft, stage of opera and line of searching corridor which reflect the time and space concepts of the haven-human induction and seasonal cycles; the borrow landscape design that intergrades winding path, windows and crypt in the gardens; ’Mountain sized as fist, pond in spoonful’as the unique rock mounting style that differ from others which attempt to mimic the natural mountain views; the concept of ’valley of the haven’ governs the water feature design that inherit conventional method of square pond set up with meander water ways that disguise of the sources-the ’Dry garden’ as a case. The belief of the glory age tribute to the aesthetic philosophies reflected on the garden structures as in integration of architecture and stone mount, grant building and long corridor; the plants that gave colors in all seasons with focus on their poses, balance of color, scents and metaphorical meanings; the life in garden such as crane might walk on the bank and carps swim in the pond. The architectures and decorations styles are notably tall and upright, compare to other typical gardens in South Yangzi river region, the decorative colours are plain and quiet; stroking lines are deliberately rough but elegant, the ministrative manner and the imported western tastes also can be found in the gardens, which remarked the openness attitudes of such extraordinary era.Yangzhou private gardens, as excellent examples, not only continued the traditional garden theories and applied the methods in the garden master handbook of ’Yuan ye’, but also are representation of the design methodology and the skills of craftsman at its time of late Qing dynasty. Its precious artistic values shines in the oriental garden history.