Summer Palace
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How it came to be
In 1750 the Qianlong Emperor began building the Garden of Clear Ripples about 10 km north-west of Beijing as a birthday gift for his mother, Empress Dowager Xiaosheng, and finished it in 1764 at a cost of 4.48 million taels of silver. Kunming Lake and Longevity Hill form its framework, with three islands and the Seventeen-Arch Bridge in the lake.
In 1860 the garden was burned by British and French forces. In 1888 the Empress Dowager Cixi rebuilt it as a summer retreat, using funds officially meant for the navy, and renamed it Yiheyuan. Lei Tingchang, seventh generation of the Lei family of architects, led the rebuilding.
It was damaged again in 1900 during the Boxer Rebellion and restored in 1903. It opened as a public park in 1924 and was inscribed in 1998.
Data: Wikidata (CC0). Photos: Wikimedia Commons, under each photo’s license. Prototype; may contain errors. We measure usage anonymously to improve the app (PostHog, EU).