Chapter 20 Section 3 Private Gardens in the South

Private gardens, especially the representative private gardens in the south, are also an important part of ancient gardens. (1) The conditions for the emergence of private gardens in the south The private gardens in the south are concentrated in today's Jiangsu and Zhejiang, especially in the cities of Suzhou, Yangzhou and Hangzhou.This is not an accidental phenomenon, but because these areas have the natural, economic and cultural conditions for building gardens.To build a natural landscape garden, there must be mountains, water and plants.In the south of the Yangtze River, the rivers are criss-cross, the river network is densely covered, and the water source is abundant.In addition to soil, stones are indispensable for gardens and mountains. Jiangsu and Zhejiang regions produce a lot of stones. Nanjing, Yixing, Kunshan, Hangzhou, and Huzhou have yellow stones, and Suzhou has produced lake stones since the Tang Dynasty.The color of the lake stones varies in shades, and the shape is exquisite and clear, which has always been the top grade in the mountains.Jiangsu and Zhejiang belong to the temperate zone, without severe cold in winter, high air humidity, suitable for growing evergreen trees, and many varieties of plants and flowers, all of which provide sufficient conditions for gardening.

Like building palaces and temples, building gardens requires economic conditions.Jiangsu and Zhejiang have been a land of fish and rice since ancient times, with a well-developed handicraft industry. Suzhou and Hangzhou have been famous for their silk production since the Han Dynasty.With the development of commerce and the prosperity of the city, Yangzhou was already an important foreign commercial port in the Tang Dynasty.The developed economy provides material conditions for gardening.But a garden is not only a material construction, but also a cultural construction, which requires humanistic conditions.The style of writing in the south of the Yangtze River has been popular since ancient times. In the Southern Song Dynasty, literati paintings and landscape poetry were popular. With the imperial court moving south to Lin'an (now Hangzhou), a large number of officials and wealthy businessmen flocked to Suzhou and Hangzhou, and gardening flourished for a while.In the Ming and Qing dynasties, scholars were selected through the imperial examination, and there were quite a few officials in this area who went to Beijing to serve as officials. These literati retired and returned to their hometowns to buy fields and build gardens.Especially in the late Qing Dynasty, when wars broke out in the north, bureaucrats and merchants fled south one after another, buying land and building gardens in Jiangsu and Zhejiang, and stealing one side.This group of literati knew calligraphy and painting, were very elegant, carefully managed their own mansions, and participated in their own garden design, which made the quantity and quality of gardening in this period reach a peak.

(2) Characteristics of private gardens in the south Both royal gardens and private gardens belong to natural landscape gardens, which imitate nature and obtain the true interest of natural landscape as the top grade, but they each have their own characteristics.Judging from the content of the garden, the royal garden has multiple functions of government affairs, life, and entertainment; while the private garden has the requirements for hospitality, reading, and entertainment.In terms of scale, the imperial gardens occupy a large area of ​​several thousand mu, and most of them are located in the outskirts of the capital; while the private gardens are attached to the houses and occupy a small area, ranging from tens of mu to a few mu. place.From the perspective of garden style, royal gardens pursue grandeur, magnificent architecture, colorful colors, and the overall composition of the garden; while private gardens pursue a peaceful and quiet atmosphere, not gorgeous architecture, light and elegant colors, and strive to create a unique style. A paradise realm isolated from the hustle and bustle of the city.

(3) Gardening techniques of private gardens Most of the private gardens are located next to the mansion. In addition to the residence, it has various requirements for hospitality, reading and entertainment.In terms of function, the residence should be hidden, the reading place should be quiet, the living room should be convenient, and the recreation part should have the interest of natural landscape.What method can be used to meet these requirements in the range of tens of acres, or even a few acres of land?In other words, what methods have been adopted in the design and construction of the garden?

First of all, in terms of layout, twists and turns are adopted, so as to create rich landscapes in a limited space.This technique is manifested in the setting of roads, which use twists and turns instead of straight avenues.Along the curved road, scenic spots are skillfully arranged, so that visitors can see different scenery along the way, and extend the viewing route in a limited space.It is manifested in the image design of scenic spots to avoid similarity and try to adopt a variety of different styles.The porch is an indispensable architectural form in southern gardens where it is rainy in spring and winter and hot in summer.However, the corridors are seldom in the form of a straight line, but are built along the wall, sometimes close to the wall, sometimes away from the wall, becoming a multi-sided and multi-directional folding corridor; Falling corridors; sometimes the corridors are formed on the water surface to form water corridors; with the ups and downs and left and right bends of these corridors, different scenic spots are set up.Sometimes it faces a small pavilion, sometimes you can see the pile of stones and bamboo bushes under the wall, and sometimes it leads directly to the entrance of the building. The porch becomes the best route to enjoy the scenery in a garden.The design of scenic spots is mainly based on architecture, including halls, pavilions, painting boats, and pavilions; but it is not limited to buildings. A pile of rocks, an ancient tree, and a cluster of green bamboos are all scenic spots for viewing, and their images have their own characteristics. , along with the curved road, it is displayed in front of the tourists in different ways, and it really achieves the wonderful effect of step-by-step scenery.

Second, he is good at summarizing and refining the image of natural landscape and reappearing it in the garden.In order to create an environment with the interest of natural landscape in a small space, it is necessary to carefully observe and study the form of natural landscape, summarize and refine it and reproduce it typically in the garden. Big, get the god of nature.For example, the use of soil or stones for piles of mountains depends on the size of the garden and the needs of the surrounding landscape. However, no matter whether it is a mountain or a rock, it should be like a natural mountain range. It should not be rigid, such as two peaks side by side. Low, not like a row of pens.If the soil is the main pile of mountains, flowers and trees can be planted widely to make the mountains lush and green. Stones of different sizes are scattered on the top and bottom of the mountain, as if the stones are exposed from the soil.If the mountain is mainly built with stones, soil should be cultivated on the top and bottom, and some flowers and trees should be planted to make it have natural vitality. If too many stones are used, even if it is a clever stone, it will lose the meaning of nature.Another example is the excavation of a pool. The shape of the pool should be curved rather than square.Because the natural lake has no square shape.On relatively large water surfaces, it is advisable to use stone bridges to divide the water surface into parts of different sizes.In order to make the stagnant water look like living water, the corner of the pool water is often turned into a thin curved stream, folded under the rocks or the base of the building, as if the water flows out from here, and the water source has no head.The treatment of the water surface should not be full of plants, even the beautiful lotus should be patchwork.It is suitable to use lotus in the distance, and plant water lily at the bridgehead on the bank for close viewing.It is not advisable to use stones all over the bank of the pool. It is better to use soil as the main material, with earth and stones alternated, stones arranged sparsely, and the heights are scattered. The high places can be used for people to stand on the water scenery, and the low places can be used for tourists to go down to the water surface. Play in the water.Therefore, no matter the size of the pool, as long as it is handled well, the size can be seen from the small, and it will not appear rigid and cramped; if it is not handled well, the pool will not be natural even though it is large.

Third, pay attention to the details of the garden.To see the big from the small, in addition to working hard on the layout and imitating the natural landscape, it is very important to pay attention to the details, including the details of architecture, landscape, and plants.There are many types of private garden buildings, including halls and halls for entertaining guests, pavilions for reading and painting, boat pavilions facing the water, and a large number of pavilions and corridors, which have different forms.The doors and windows on the building are even more diverse.There are rectangular doors, round hole doors, octagonal doors, and plum blossom-shaped, ruyi-shaped and various bottle-shaped doors. In addition to ordinary windows on the walls, there are flower windows, empty windows, leaky windows, and patterns on the windows. One or two hundred styles can be found in Suzhou gardens alone (Figure 20).Even the ground of the garden is made of bricks, tiles, and pebbles to create various patterns.In addition to being used as a pile of mountains, stones also like to be viewed independently or in combination.The garden builder chooses stones with varying shades of color and exquisite images, together with a few plants and flowers, and places them in front of the hall and under the wall, just like a large bonsai for people to appreciate. Here, the stone has become an independent sculpture. The artwork is gone (Fig. 21).