Yuanmingyuan Ruins Park guide
An imperial garden in fragments
Yuanmingyuan grew from the Kangxi period into three connected gardens. It combined southern Chinese landscape design, palace compounds and European-style fountains and façades.
In 1860, Anglo-French forces looted and burned the complex. The Western Mansions are now the most legible ruins, though the surviving columns and carved stone were only part of buildings once finished with timber roofs and interiors.
Do not stop at the Western Mansions. Lakes, islands and terrain still occupy most of the grounds, and a broader circuit needs at least half a day.
