Yuyuan Garden

Overview
 

Location
This small park is located in the heart of Shanghai’s old Chinese quarter and links to Yuyuan Market.
 
History
Built in 1559 during the Ming Dynasty in the Suzhou style by a high official Pan Yunduan in honor of his father, the garden has maintained its classic beauty over the centuries. The Yuyuan Garden was considered the best garden in Southeast China. The Pavilion of Spring in the northeast section of the park is famous for being the headquarters of the anti-imperialist "Little Sword Society", who in 1853 led an uprising against Qing rule and occupied Shanghai for 17 months. Weapons, coins and other objects used by the society are now housed in an exhibition hall. 
 
Introduction
It is a renowned traditional landscape garden in Jiangnan. It is also a historical site and tourist attraction famous at home and abroad. It was built by a man named Pan during the Ming Dynasty. It was changed and rebuilt for hundreds of years by different descendents of the original builder. The garden is a virtual maze of caves, gardens, rockeries, paths, bridges, and buildings. Even though many people have had a hand in rebuilding the garden over the centuries, it is seamlessly blended. Every corner you turn has a new surprise, and a total different view. It is often the situation that a person has come across a single area from three different places, and don’t realize he kept coming to the same place. It was ingeniously built and shows the amazing architectural style of Ming and Qing Dynasty. There are also hundreds of precious stele carvings which are done by famous artists in the past. There are six main tourist sections in Yu Garden. Each section has its own special sights. 

After entering the garden, for a while, you may see a big rockery with springs and small waterfalls. It has a reputation that it is the best rockery in Jiangnan district. The building "Cui Xiu Tang" is the main sight in this section. From the building "Yu He Xie" to" Wan Hua Lou", there are full of exquisite corridors, rivers, rockeries, courtyards. The stone hill – Jade Exquisite (Yu Ling Long in Chinese) is the treasure of the Yu Garden. It is praised as the No.1 of the famous three stones in Jiangnan district. Facing the Jade Exquisite is the building "Yu Hua Tang". Inside it, it is a traditional sanctum in Ming Dynasty. All the desks and chairs are made of precious rosewood. The Inner Garden is also called the East Garden. It was alone in the past. But now, it belongs to the Yu Garden. It was first built in 1709(in Qing Dynasty). There are a lot of rockeries, halls, pavilions, corridors, etc. All of the buildings strew at random. 

The main building is this garden is Qing Xue Tang. It is so exquisite and elegant and has the feature of Chinese traditional landscape garden. Outside of the garden, there are many famous sights like water lily pool. A lot of brick carvings, stone carvings, mud sculptures, and wood sculptures intersperse among the Yu Garden. They not only have a long history but also have extremely exquisite designs. Among them, The Eight Immortals Going across the Sea, Guanghan Palace, etc, has high value of viewing and culture relic.

Features
The best garden in Southeast China A historical site and tourist attraction famous at home and abroad High value of viewing and culture relic