Liangyuan Liangyuan: The Four Gardens in Lingnan

The Liang Garden of the Four Gardens of Lingnan 📍Liang Garden actually refers to a series of gardens built by the Liang family in Foshan during the late Qing Dynasty and the Republic of China. 🔸Today, only the "Stars Thatched Cottage" can be seen, and the others such as Twelve Stones Studio, Hanxiang Pavilion, Fenjiang Thatched Cottage, etc. have all been destroyed. ✔️I checked several books about Lingnan gardens and found that even the "Stars Thatched Cottage" now exists is a ruined garden with all its essence lost. 🔸The "Lingnan Garden" written by Mr. Xia Changshi and Mo Bozhi published in the 1960s describes the "Stars Cottage": "In the prominent position of the garden road, there are some peak-shaped standing stones, or small and large rocks. Decorated with brown bamboo shrubs and shaded by trees and rocks, it seems that in addition to the loose rocks on the peaks and exposed soil, there are also rock roots underneath. There is no artificiality and a natural attitude. 🔸The earth piled in the south of the courtyard is similar to a 'pinggang hill', with marble stones scattered along the foot of the slope. It has the realm of 'the foot of the mountain before the mountain', which is unrestrained and unique." It has reached the 80's described in Mr. Lu Qi's "Lingnan Private Garden" The situation at that time was already "shallow lakes and ponds, with strange rocks scattered". The "Stars Thatched Cottage" originally relied on its stone scenery to surprise and win. Now that the exotic stones are missing, the essence is naturally gone. 🔸The area where Liang Garden is located should be the settlement of the Liang family in Foshan. The family's ancestral hall and residence are all in one place. Gardens should be built year by year and interspersed in this area. In the middle of the area where the Liang family lives, there is a long strip of water running east-west. I don't know if this water area used to be a section of Foshan's inland river, but now it is an independent small lake. 🔸In the book "Illustrated Lingnan Architecture" published by Hong Kong Zhonghe, there is a photo not long ago, which looks like a river with low buildings on both sides of the lake, giving it a Lingnan water town charm. This kind of architectural group laid out along the river, with residences, ancestral halls, and gardens complementing each other, forms a small world of its own. It is the ideal life pursued by traditional Lingnan literati. 🔸Unfortunately, most of the buildings on the north bank of the water have been demolished. In an attempt to rebuild the Fenjiang thatched cottage, a large green park-like space was built. Maybe the construction body thinks that this is the garden. 🔸The demolished building may not have been built by the Liang family, but its texture and volume have been inherited, especially the meaning of living along the river, which is the charm of the Lingnan water town. It is really stupid to be demolished as rubbish. things. 🔸Liang Yuan In the bibliographies introducing Lingnan gardens published in recent years, there is not much information, and there is no content to record. This is generally due to the encroachment and destruction in recent decades, as well as the damage caused by self-repair. 🔸The "foothills before the mountains" in Lingnan is such a free and unrestrained artistic conception, which makes people fascinated, but it is a pity that it cannot be reproduced in the end.