Old Summer Palace: Ruined Debris of a western-style garden

Old Summer Palace is the ‘garden of gardens' in oriental world. And the story of the Old Summer Palace is both the story of a miracle, and a tragedy for all mankind.

The Gardens of Perfect Clarity is known for its extensive collection of garden and building architectures and other works of art. Its grandeur and magnificence dwarfed all other royal gardens in the world.

But in 1860, troops from Britain and France broke in, killed, looted, smashed, and burned the whole place to the ground. A masterpiece was no more!

Over a period of 150 years since 1707, the imperial architects and skillful craftsmen replicated all particularly beautiful gardens whenever the emperors found during their inspection tours of China.

The Imperial Gardens were made up of three gardens: the Garden of Perfect Brightness proper, the Garden of Eternal Spring, and the Elegant Spring Garden. Together they covered an area almost 5 times the size of the Forbidden City. They had hundreds of halls, pavilions, temples, galleries, gardens, lakes, etc. You can also find exotic (European-style) buildings and objects, as Emperor Qianlong employed western artists to structure the palace.

Looking at a maze of ruined debris and standing in the midst of this desolation, pity, grief, and a furious anger inhabited my heart. For this field of ruins should have been a masterpiece, a work of timeless art adorned with age-old calligraphies, refined paintings, historical archives, exquisite porcelains, never-to-be-found-again jades, and rare species of plants. Each one an architectural and artistic miracle

But history has pass by, what we need to do is better protect this palace. As t Victor Hugo, the great French litterateur of 19th century indicated: the Old Summer Palace, both in its past splendor and present desolation, belongs to all mankind.