It took Emperor Zhudi only 14 years (1406-1420) to build his royal palace in Beijing. The royal palace, popularly known as the Forbidden City, was the permanent residence of 24 emperors of the Ming and Qing Dynasties (1368-1911). It covers over 720,000 square meters of floor space, with more than 8,700 rooms, surrounded by city wall as high as ten meters and a city moat as wide as 52 meters.
The capital museum now can book just one day before visit, and the limitation of visitors is now up to 4,000 each day, except Monday (closed).
Beijing Planetarium is a national leader in public astronomy. It contains two parts: Beijing Planetarium and Beijing Ancient Observatory.
Beijing Planetarium consists of new building and the old Planetarium. The new facility is designed by Nonchi Wang, it has several exciting parts: Digital space theater, 3D theater, 4D theater, exhibition hall, two observatories.
As an ancient Chinese proverb goes as “an inch of sandalwood is equal to an inch of gold”, the red sandalwood (紫檀木) is more usually purplish-red, sometimes with grayish-black hues – colors and shades that represented the prestige and solemnity of imperial rule centuries ago. It gives off a pleasing musty aroma. The average red sandalwood tree takes 300 years to reach full growth, and only some 10 percent of its content can be put to practical use. Hence the wood’s rarity and why it is now a popular collectable. A piece of ancient sandalwood furniture fetched US$11.29 million at a 1996 Sotheby’s auction.
The National Art Museum of China, or NAMOC (Chinese: 中国美术馆) is located on 1 Wusi Ave, Dongcheng District of Beijing, People’s Republic of China. The construction was started in 1958 and finished in 1962. It is one of the Great Ten Constructions to mark the occasion of the 10th Anniversary of the Founding of the People’s Republic of China. Chairman Mao wrote the name of the museum.It has a total land area of 30,000 square meters. The museum has been renovated from May 2004 to January 2005, and has been added an additional area of 5,375 square meters.
With a floor area of more than 60,000 square meters, Capital Museum is second only to the National Museum of China in terms of size. To see all the exhibitions in the new museum, it would take at least four or five hours, as there said to be about 5,622 items on display.
Beijing Art Museum is located in Wanshou Temple(the Temple of Longevity). Wanshou Temple was built in 1577 under the reign of Wanli Emperor of the Ming dynasty to store Buddhist scriptures in Chinese. It gradually became a temporary imperial dweling and a place of birthday celebration for the imperial family during the Ming and Qing Dynasties.
Beijing Art Museum has collected and preserved the precious historical relics such as bronze and jade articles of Shang and Zhou Dynasties (17th-3th centuries B.C), and the ancient art treasures as potteries, porcelains, enamels, carved lacquer ware, ivory carving ,wood carving, etc of the past dynasties.
The Beijing Museum of Traditional Opera is located inside the Beijing Huguang Guildhall Chamber of Cultural Prosperity and Ancestral Hall of the Local Worthy.
The museum’s various exhibits have distinctively artistic characteristics. On display in the exhibition hall are several dozen biographies, cultural relics, and costumes and instruments that trace the history of Chinese traditional opera. Stage photos of Peking opera masters in performance are also exhibited.
Situated on Liulichang, Beijing’s antique street is the architecturally important Songtangzhai Folk Carving Museum. Privately owned by manager Li Songtang’s family, this gallery is a two-story building from the Qing Dynasty.
The uniquely cohesive exhibition hall and collection, including the stone stairs, gate screen and ceilings, are all part of Li’s functional, as well as beautiful collection.
Beijing Dabaotai Xi Han Dynasty Tomb Museum is a very unique emperor site museum. It was built up more than two thousand years ago in the site of the underground palace of Liu Jian (73 B.C. to 45 B.C.), who is the Guanyanqing Feudal Prince in the Western Han Dynasty.
