Former residence of Xue Fucheng

Also known as Xue's garden, it is the residence of Xue Fucheng, a famous thinker, diplomat and representative of bourgeois reformers from Wuxi in the late Qing Dynasty. According to Xue Fucheng's official character, the width of his living hall can't exceed five rooms, but actually there are nine rooms. It's not against the rules to do so. It's Lao Xue's trick to use a unique split double row column to turn a nine bay into a relatively independent three Bay, which is not the second in the country.

The biggest architectural feature of Xuejia garden is the combination of Chinese and western. The western style moving doors of the car hall and main hall, the cornice machine engraving board of the turntable building, the stairs, the Roman columnar railings made by the car in the corridor, the cement prefabricated doors of the billiard room, the window frames, and the colored glass are all Chinese and Western style. Coupled with pavilions, small water, garden, wooden building. It's a good place for summer night.

Former residence of Xue Fucheng

Xue Fucheng (1838-1894) is a famous thinker, diplomat and representative of early bourgeois reformers in modern Chinese history. Xue Fucheng's former residence is located in the west of Jiankang Road, Chong'an District, Wuxi City, Jiangsu Province. It was built from 1890 (the 16th year of the reign of Emperor Guangxu of the Qing Dynasty) to 1894 (the 20th year of Emperor Guangxu of the Qing Dynasty). It is known as "the first luxury house in the south of the Yangtze River". The former residential complex has a large scale and reasonable layout, covering an area of more than 21000 square meters and a construction area of 5600 square meters. The building is divided into three roads: Central Road, East Road and West Road. From south to north, the central road is respectively Zhaobi, foyer, main hall, room hall, turntable building and back garden; the east road is flower hall, stage, storehouse hall and warehouse; the west road is partial hall, miscellaneous room and library.

In 2001, it was designated as a national key cultural relics protection unit by the State Council. In April 1995, the people's Government of Jiangsu Province announced it as a provincial-level cultural relics protection unit.

In February 2020, in order to express our gratitude to the medical staff, we will implement the free admission policy for medical workers and their spouses and children from the date of the resumption of the park to December 31, 2020.

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brief introduction

Wuxi Xuejia garden is a large-scale bureaucratic residence of Xue Fucheng, a famous thinker, diplomat, political commentator, litterateur and representative of early bourgeois reformers in Wuxi in the late Qing Dynasty. It is located in the downtown area of Wuxi, covering an area of 21000 square meters. Xue Fucheng was good at thinking, diligent in writing, brave in practice, and made remarkable achievements in domestic and foreign affairs. Therefore, the Qing government awarded him the "imperial envoy No. 1" for his historical achievements. Up to now, the inscription "imperial envoy Di" written by Emperor Guangxu is still hanging on the forehead of general Xue's gate.

Xue Fucheng's former residence was built in 1890 and completed in 1894. There are more than 160 preserved buildings with a construction area of 6000 square meters. The whole group of buildings is majestic and distinctive, reflecting the characteristics of the time when the west wind spread to the East in the late Qing Dynasty, filling the gap in the architectural history of our country, known as "the first luxury house in the south of the Yangtze River". In 2001, it was designated as a national key cultural relics protection unit by the State Council.

The first imperial envoy was Xue Fucheng. Before he was sent to Britain, France, Italy and Belgium, he personally designed the construction sketch and handed it over to his eldest son Xue Nanming for construction. The former residence of Xue Fucheng, Qinshi No.1, has a regular layout and strict functional division. The courtyard is divided into three axes: the central axis, the East axis and the West axis. The front axis is narrow and the back axis is wide. The central axis is composed of hall, sedan hall, main hall, back hall, turntable building and back garden. The East axis is composed of western style billiard room, Xue Cang hall, control hall, loquat garden, Yinfeng Pavilion and stage. The West axis is composed of Chuanjing building, West Garden, Buddhist hall and miscellaneous room form. The front four entrances of the central axis are all nine Bay in width, and the fifth and sixth entrances of the turntable building are eleven Bay in width. It is the largest turntable building in China and is known as "the first turntable building in China".

Landscape features

Influenced by the western culture, Xue Fucheng's homestead also shows the characteristics of western style, which is reflected in the combination of Chinese and Western architectural style. The main building basically follows the regulations of the middle and late Qing Dynasty, and the fine carving decoration is superb, reflecting the highest level of Chinese architectural technology. The eaves of turntable building, billiard house and other buildings show the characteristics of the times with Chinese style and Western style. As for Xue Huidong's house, it is a baroque building with European style.

Xue Fucheng's former residence is a bureaucratic residence with an open courtyard pattern. Modern residential buildings and Jiangnan gardening art are combined harmoniously. On the central axis, between each hall, the courtyard is decorated with different scenery. The independent back garden, West Garden, corridor bridges, pavilions, qiaoke and rocks in the house are in harmony, with elegant and beautiful environment. The flower hall and stage in the east garden form their own courtyard, which is a rare place for watching opera, watching fish and drinking tea. Its waterside stage is the most unique, which is rare in China.

Xue Fucheng's former residence, qinshidi, is a large-scale bureaucratic residence in the south of the Yangtze River in the period of social transformation in modern China. It has great historical value, research value and tourism value.

When Xue Fucheng built his house, his official title was the third grade, and he was rewarded with the second grade. According to the regulations of the imperial court, the width of the hall of his house could not exceed five rooms, but his house had far exceeded the standard. For this reason, when the Xue family built the house, they used the unique split double row columns in the most eye-catching sedan hall and main hall, turning the nine bay into three relatively independent three Bay. The main hall is separated by the exquisite hexagonal honeycomb brick wall and the moving door with Western room decoration style, which is unique in Wuxi area and has not been reported in the whole country. The main hall is the most important and luxurious hall in the whole house. Its carved beams and painted buildings are well preserved and exquisitely carved. The light of flying gold and the burden brocade of red lacquer all show the luxury style. The brick carving and wood carving in the main hall are incomparable with other buildings in the former residence.

Main landscape

General gate

It is composed of two "hehe" gates. The east door frame is the door Dang, and the west door frame is the door pair, which means "door Dang". Looking up at the forehead of the general's gate, you can see a vertical plaque inscribed by Emperor Guangxu with the blue background and gold characters "imperial envoy Di". The imperial envoy's residence means the residence of ambassadors appointed by the Imperial Envoys to Britain, France, Italy and Belgium.

courtyard

Another characteristic of Xue Fucheng's former residence is that it can perfectly combine the landscape with the former residence. In the former residence, there is a patio between every two entrances, and the two sides are decorated with the relative courtyard scenery. In addition, there are independent East Garden, back garden and West Garden in the former residence, which makes the whole former residence a garden style residence. Therefore, old Wuxi is used to call Xue Fu Xue's garden.

Xue Fucheng once wrote a book named Yangzhai juyao, which specially introduces how to build homestead. He designed this house to implement some construction principles and Fengshui requirements in Yangzhai juyao. We can see that the former residence is a narrow one in front and wide one in back, and the whole former residence is in the shape of "convex". Looking down from the air, it is like a giant Kunpeng flying with wings, which coincides with Chuang Tzu's saying that "the Peng's wings are strong and the water blows three thousand li" and "the movement of wings will move to Nanmi". If you think about it carefully, Xue Fucheng's great ambition is not only reflected in his eldest son's names "Yiyun" and "Nanming", but also reflected in his house's graphics.

Sedan Hall

It is the second main building on the central axis. Sedan hall, as the name suggests, is the place where sedan chairs are parked, which is equivalent to a modern private garage. Deputy director Chen Honghua tells us that the three rooms in the middle are called "xiliaotang", which is a carriage used by the ancient envoys. "Xiliaotang" means that Xue Fucheng, the master of xiliaotang, was sent to four western countries. Let us feel the grand scale of the imperial envoy. From east to west, there are nine houses.

Speaking of "Nine", we know that in the feudal society with strict hierarchy, people's houses were strictly classified. During the Hongwu Period of Ming Dynasty, the imperial court had a clear regulation on the specifications of houses, and the Qing Dynasty also used this regulation: under six grade officials, the width of their houses should not exceed three rooms, and the depth should not exceed seven frames; from five grade officials to three grade officials, the width should not exceed five rooms, and the depth should not exceed seven frames; from two grade officials to three grade officials, the width should not exceed five rooms, and the depth should not exceed nine frames. When Xue Fucheng was building his own house, he had the official title of "zhengsanpin" and "zhongjiapin", which was equivalent to the present cadre. Even according to the second grade official, Xue Fucheng's living hall can't be more than five rooms wide. However, Xue Fucheng's house has nine rooms wide in the first four entrances, and eleven rooms wide in the fifth and sixth entrances, far exceeding the standard issued by the imperial court. Nine is an extreme number in ancient China. It is a very sacred number, which means "the Ninth Five Year Plan". Generally, nine Bay houses can only appear in the imperial palace. If we don't take special measures, it may lead to death because of "deviance". Xue Fu was mature enough to know the laws and regulations of the imperial court. He specially took care of his son Xue Nanming. In the sedan hall and the main hall, which were the two most eye-catching halls, they all adopted the unique method of splitting the nine halls into three relatively separate halls. The so-called bisection column refers to two semicircle columns juxtaposed together. From a distance, it seems to be a column; from a close view, there is a gap several centimeters wide in the middle. In response to this, the stone drum Deng of the column is also made of two semicircles, the main beam and walking beam on the column

Chinese PinYin : Xue Fu Cheng Gu Ju