Chinese Garden Design - Site Analysis

According to Yuan Ye, the most important design principle of the private Chinese garden is that one should follow the natural lie of the land to obtain good views. In order to follow the site to create the best design, Chinese gardeners must first investigate and explore carefully the natural landscape resources of the site, and seek inspiration directly from the site’s characteristic environmental atmosphere. Chinese gardeners would never destroy the natural configuration of the site. Instead, they would simply improve the site while attempting to retain its natural charm.

If the site itself is a plain land with unfavorable qualities, Chinese gardeners would place attention on the environment off the site to find any proper scenery which could be “borrow”, such as a Tao temple in the remote hill, a pavilion in the lakeside, even a flower in the neighboring garden. The place that takes advantage of these scenes will be preserved for the main halls.

The Chinese gardeners endeavor to use natural resources. Water was seldom introduced in private Chinese gardens artificially. Finding the natural water supplies was usually a top priority during the site analysis. Fortunately, southern China has an abundance of water resources. That is the main reason why the private Chinese gardens usually can keep well-balanced ecosystems requiring little maintenance.

Walls were raised to keep away the hubbub of the street and to take the site, perhaps in the mist of the city, back to nature. The walls that kept the garden a secluded place usually were hidden by the heavy trees or rockery to avoid the feeling of constriction.

Yiyouan Garden Plan

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