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Classical Chinese Gardens

© Kirk Johnson

Chinese gardens had a superficial influence on 18th Century English landscape gardens (the French called this style of garden "Anglo-Chinois"); this was mainly from fanciful descriptions of Chinese gardens. In the 20th Century, Japanese gardens have had a strong influence on the gardens of Western Civilization, but Chinese gardens have been ignored.

This situation seems to be changing, New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art has a reproduction of the Dianchunyi (Hall For Staying Spring) and its courtyard garden; this is a part of the Wangshi Yuan (usually called the Retired Fisherman's Garden or the Master of Net's Garden) in Suzhou (Soochow). This was one of the first attempts to give Westerners who have never been to China the experience of being in a Classical Chinese Garden.

Vancouver, British Columbia now has the Dr. Sun Yat-Sen garden; it is a full scale classical Chinese style garden. And Portland, Oregon is getting ready to construct a classical Suzhou style garden. All three of these gardens are in the Suzhou style.

Suzhou is known for having the most refined gardens in China. It is a bit of a mistake to regard Suzhou gardens as typically Chinese. For example, Yangzhou was dominated by prosperous merchants, rather than scholars, and their gardens reflected this. Suzhou gardens were intended for small gatherings of refined gentlemen, while Yangzhou gardens were created as places to hold large parties and to display wealth. The imperial gardens of Bejing were intended to awe visitors, they are not as exquisite as Suzhou gardens, but this is not really a flaw; it is just that they were created for another purpose.

One thing that all old Chinese gardens have in common is that their design was dominated by the art of feng shui. The basic idea behind feng shui is that streams of chi (meaning vital spirit or cosmic breath) flow though the earth and were affected by the earth's topography. Any changes in the landscape are believed to affect the flow of chi, in both positive and negative ways. How a dwelling was situated in relation to the winds (feng), waters (shui), hills (kan) and valleys (yu) were believed to affect the fortunes of those who lived in the house.

One of the positive ways in which that landscape could be altered was by slowly leading water through a garden and collecting the water in pools before the main pavilions; this was so that the occupants of the pavilions could gain the maximum benefit. Feng shui is about balancing the effects of the opposing yin and yang forces. Many classical Chinese gardens feature pools with large rockeries placed next to them. These rockeries are not like European rock gardens; they are composed out of large stones or smaller stones mortared together. These rockeries represent the Yang force contained within the bony structure of the earth; the water of the pond was believed to contain the yin force.