The Chinese ge is similar to the lou in that both are of two or more storey buildings. But the ge has a door and windows only on the front side with the other three sides being solid walls. Ge are usually enclosed by wooden balustrades or decorated with boards all around.
Such storeyed pavilions were used in ancient times for the storage of important articles and documents. Wenyuange for instance, in the Forbidden City of Beijing was in effect the imperial library. Kuiwenge in the Confucius Temple of Qufu, …

 
When the Chinese speak of a lou, they refer to any building of two or more storeys with a horizontal main ridge. The erection of such buildings began a long time ago in the Period of the Warring States (475-221 B. C. ), when chonglou (”layered houses”) was mentioned in historical records.
Ancient buildings with more than one storey were meant for a variety of uses. The smaller two-storeyed buildings of private homes generally has the owner’s study or bedroom upstairs. The more magnificent ones built in parks or at …

The tai was an ancient architectural sturture, a very much elevated terrace with a flat top. Generally built of earth, stone and surfaced with brick, they are used as a belvedere from which to look into the distance. In fact, however, many well-known ancient tai as we know it today is not just a bare platform but has some palatial halls built on top.
A good example is the Round City of the Beihai Park in Beijing. A terrace five metres high, it has an area of 4, 500 square …

A common sight in the country, the Chinese pavilion (ting, which means also a kiosk) is built normally either of wood or stone or bamboo and may be in any of several shapes – square, triangle, hexagon, octagon, a five-petal flower, a fan and more. But all pavilions have columns for support and no walls. In parks or in scenic places, pavilions are built on slopes to command the panorama or they are built by the lakeside to create intriguing images by the water.
Pavilions also serve diverse purposes. The …

The dragon and the phoenix are the principal motifs for decorative designs on buildings, clothing and articles of daily use in the imperial palace. The throne hall is supported by columns entwined by gilded dragons, the central ramps on marble steps were paved with huge slabs carved in relief with the dragon and phoenix, and the screen walls display dragons in brilliant colours. The names in the Chinese language for nearly all the things connected with the emperor or the empress were preceded by the epithet “dragon” or “phoenix”. Thus …

It may not be common knowledge among Western visitors that the number “nine” carried a special significance in old China. Ancient Chinese regarded odd numbers as being masculine and even numbers as being feminine. “Nine”, which is the largest single digit number was taken to mean the “ultimate masculine” and was, therefore, symbolic of the supreme sovereignty of the emperor. For this reason, the number “nine” (or its multiples) is often employed in palace structures and designs. A noticeable example is the number of studs on palace gates. The studs …

The (Chinese word for “palace” is gong. However, it may refer to anyone of several different meanings.
In the earliest Chinese writings it meant no more than an ordinary house. After the founding of the Qin Dynasty (221- 207 B. C.), gong came gradually to mean the group of buildings in which the emperor lived and worked. At about the same time, Chinese palaces grew ever larger in scale. The Efanggong of the First Emperor of Qin measured “5 li (2 1/2 km) from east to west and 1,000 paces …