- Fengshui: the fading Landscape of Chinese Cities and cultural Heritage Sites - Case Study of Wuchang City and Wudang ancient Building Complexes    60 kb by    DING, Yuan | dingyuan24@yahoo.com.cn    Short Outline Fengshui, traditionally binding the natural aspects and the cultural, has been re-interpreted and forgotten in China since 1840. With two cases, the author discusses the vicissitude of Fengshui in general and Wudang and Wuchang in particular. Abstract Fengshui, the Geomancy and traditionally spiritual landscape of the Chinese heritage sites and cities, has been re-interpreted and forgotten in China since China lost the war with UK in 1840. With the case study of Ancient Building Complexes on Wudang Mountain and Wuchang City, the author discussed the vicissitude of Fengshui in general and the development of the Wudang building complexes and Wuchang City in particular. Wudang architectural groups mainly consist of the royal temples and palaces built in 15th century. Being one of the most important monuments in China, Wudang building complexes has been included as the cultural heritage on the World Heritage List in 1998. However, not only Chinese experts re-interpreted this great work within the modern scientific framework, but also forgot submitting this great site with the type of Cultural Landscape. Another case came from the city of Wuchang. Like many other traditional cities in China, Wuchang was originally developed from the idea of Fengshui, but when new cultural and political power step by step came into the central, Fengshui, the symbol of old identity, was doomed to disappear and Wuchang was doomed to change. During this process, a new metropolis, Wuhan, came into being and Wuchang became one of the three parts of this new metropolis for the functional requirement in 1927. Since then, thanks to 80 years¡¯ construction, Wuchang, a city enjoyed more than 1000 years¡¯ history, finally became a new town with modern atmosphere. Keywords Fengshui, re-interpretation, Wuchang Case Study presented on the ISOCARP Congress 2008: Urban Growth without Sprawl   Click to open the full paper as pdf document   Click to send an email to the author(s) of this paper