Hue's Garden House

Apart from palaces, tombs, pagodas, temples..., Hue is also famous for its garden-houses, seen as a typical and unique characteristic of Hue City. Hue people have had a close attachment with the nature since the old days. Hue architecture is always nestled in the nature and the nature is a miniature within the house area depending on each individual. House and garden, people and scenery, plants, clouds and water co-exist and blending with each other in a harmonious context full of humane colors.

We'd like to recommend some of famous garden house in Hue as below.

An Hien Garden House

An Hien Garden House is located in Xuan Hoa Village, Huong Long commune on an area of 4,608 sq.m. This was originally the residence of the 18th daughter of Duc Duc Emperor. After 1895, it was transferred to Mr. Pham Dang Thap, a son of a high-ranking mandarin under Gia Long reign. In 1920, this house was transferred to Mr. Tung Le. The last owner of this house was Mr. Nguyen Dinh Chi, a province chief. He moved into the residence in 1938. When he died, his wife, Mrs. Dao Thi Yen continued to live in this house. She was the person who led the school boycott of Dong Khanh students against the French colonialism in 1927. She then became the Principal of Dong Khanh High School, member of the sixth and seventh National Assembly, and a commissioner of Vietnam Fatherland Front Committee. Accordingly, An Hien Garden House is closely connected with the name, age, life and cause of an active nationalist who had a great contribution to Hue City.

The gate of the house has an ancient arch design. The gate roof is decorated with a tiger-face figure and stylized designs on both sides. In the middle of the gate, from the outside, under the roof is a book-shaped panel embossed in the wall. A brick board of two Chinese characters meaning An Hien is inlaid with pieces of green and white terracotta in the black background. Above the panel, there are symmetrically two bats spreading their wings and looking down the gate. Right under the book-shaped panel is a colorfully and elegantly tiger-faced figure in a semicircular shape.

An Hien Garden has been described as a fine, sharp, and unique work by many writers. In the garden, many kinds of flowers grow. There are popular kinds of flowers such as jasmine, pergularia, pomegranate, sunflower, climbing rose and indigenous roses. Aristocratic flowers consist of all kinds of orchids and land orchids. Besides the modern roses imported from the European GauJard and Meilland companies, you can find wild tomentose roses. Particularly, the garden has a big camellia presented by a Japanese Flower Association. In addition to the flower abundance, the garden also has many precious fruit-trees yielding year-around sweet fruits, namely mangosteen, durian, Thieu litchi, especially Tien Dien persimmon which are brought from Nghi Xuan district, Ha Tinh Province by a great-grandchild of the great poet Nguyen Du as a present for Mr. And Mrs. Nguyen Dinh Chi. This is a precious and rare kind of persimmon; it bears very delicious seedless fruits every July.

An Hien Garden House is a special cultural characteristic contributing to the beauty of Hue. Entering the garden, you will have a feeling of living in a miniature universe, in a peaceful and charming world. It has an attraction which is always secret as an unfinished book.

Ngoc Son Princess Garden house

Princess Ngoc Son was a daughter of Dong Khanh Emperor. When she got married, Dong Khanh Emperor granted her an area of 2,370 sq.m for building a private residence.

Ngoc Son Princess garden area has a wind-screen, rockwork, and a lotus pond. It was built relatively early and almost intactly preserved by the descendant generations. The whole garden area is planned methodically in accordance with eastern geomancy rules including a wind-screen, a bright pond, and the position of attending dragon and lying tiger, etc.

The main house is built according to the traditional housing architecture. Entering the house, we can feel a solemn and ancient atmosphere that is totally different from the ordinary life. The whole house shows an elegant life, a bright soul, and an art fondness of the owner. The main house turns its back on the road for both reasons, namely a good direction choice suitable for the owner�s age and an escape from the noisy and effervescent atmosphere of the urban life. The harmony of three factors of Architecture-Human-Natural of the house garden has achieved fineness and created a marvelous attraction to persons who have come here.

Lac Tinh Garden house

Lac Tinh Garden was founded in 1889 by the poet Hong Khang. It is located on an area of 2,070 sq.m. in the former Duong Xuan village, now it is at 65 Phan Dinh Phung Street, Hue City. Lac Tinh Garden has a beautiful and cool setting with a symmetrical arrangement of two rows of hibiscuses, roses, laurel and ochna atropurpurea along the path leading to the house. Under the trees are small tables and chairs for enjoying the view and drinking tea. At the end of the path is a stylized book-shaped screen. With the structure of hexagonal beehive, the screen creates openness for the garden and reduces the separation between the house and the surrounding.

There are four houses adjacent to each other in the Lac Tinh Garden. Each house has its own name, which has a special meaning and closely connects in meaning with the owner.

Nhan Hau House (Benevolent House) is used for receiving guests, enjoying the moon and flowers and also distributing relief for the poor. It has an open architecture of parterres and bonsais putting around the house instead of walls.

Hy Tran Trai House is located in the middle of the garden. The interior is decorated with many wood panels. The main compartment has fifty-nine iron wood columns with the flat tiled roof. Rafters are carved with images of dragon, Chinese character, four seasons, eight weapons, etc. by the professional skill of talent artists.

Di Tam Thich The Duong House is a place of studying and living for the offspring.

The architecture and special arrangement of decorated articles; appliances of the house give all four houses an ancient appearance. They give visitors a strong impression of elegance, refinement, and remind them being light in their steps, soft in their voice, etc. Accordingly, when going out of the Lac Tinh Garden and facing the mundane world, we suddenly want to come back to find the cultural way of life, fondness for learning, behavior manner of aristocrats under the old Nguyen Dynasty.

Y Thao Garden House

The owner of Y Thao Garden is an official in Thua Thien Hue cultural branch. This 1,300 sq.m garden was constructed fifty years ago. In the middle of the garden is a big rockwork arranged by stones and used as a screen. The two sides are two other small rockworks arranged as variations of Green Dragon and White Tiger.
The rockwork of Green Dragon is gone with a small pond. The White Tiger rockwork is arranged with a small bush symbolizing thousands pines and apricots. Moreover, tourist can find five other rock-works scattered on the grass cover in the garden. They symbolize five famous mountains of the East. The whole of trees in the garden is a meticulous collection, which is carefully looked after by the owner. Perhaps, the most precious thing of Y Thao Garden is two collections of typical fine arts of Hue.

The first collection is over 200 Hue blue porcelains produced under the dynasties of Le-Trinh King, Nguyen Lord over three hundreds years ago. Tourists will be attracted by antique appearance, ancient dynastic titles written in Demotic script (ancient Vietnamese script) and Chinese characters, etc.

The second is Hue mirror painting collection including mirror paintings inlaid with nacre, paintings of princess portrait, scenes in a classical drama extract, four panel paintings of music, chess, poetry, painting, a painting of eight deities, etc.

They are rare antiques with the present value increasing manifolds in comparison with their own real value.

Visiting Y Thao Garden, tourist will surely not wish to come back home quickly as visiting other tourist sites. For researchers on art history, the third or fourth visit to Y Thao Garden will not be their last visit.

Especially, since the Festival Hue 2000, Y Thao Garden has been a place of receiving tourists, serving family meals, vegetarian and non-vegetarian dishes of Hue specialty. The food and service is good, and the ambiance is congenial.

With such value, Garden-houses are not only Hue tangible heritage, but also an intangible heritage in a high-end life of former Hue aristocrats that could be found nowhere, but Hue only garden-houses becomes an inseparable part of all itineraries for visitors to Hue city.