Kaiping City lies in the southern part of central Guangdong Province, west of the Pearl River Delta. It is 110 kilometres from Guangzhou [Canton] City. The Tanjiang River, part of the West River system, flows through the area, with many tributaries flowing through the district to join it. The area lies within the tropical climate zone and is influenced by the oceanic monsoon winds. The climate is warm with adequate rainfall and is ideal for crop-farming and the rearing of animals. The area has two riceharvests a year, and the percentage of tillableland is comparatively high.

Kaiping has many hills and low mountains, usable land is restricted, and it is under the influence of the monsoon winds. It is, therefore, important for the villages to be built on higher land. This allows them to take the best advantage of the geography and to fit harmoniously into the local environment. Unlike those nuclear villages where houses encircle ancestral halls, Kaiping villages tend to be scattered in blocks according to the dictates of the local geography. They form a harmonious whole, in accordance with the traditional saying: “Man fits into the environment within the bounds of a single village”. Thus, this development pattern is an ideal one.

Village in Kaiping-1

The village houses are close to each other, accessed by transverse lanes which run through the village in parallel lines. This allows for a communal water disposal system and and for breezes to blow through. Gates at the entrance to the village, and dense woods of bamboo and other trees, surrounding the village, make each one an enclosed area, shut off from the outside world. In the front of the village are open areas for communal activities and rice-drying. In accordance with the traditional saying “To the right an ancestral shrine, to the left a shrine to the earthgods”, the village has the following landscapes: an ancestral hall for the worship of the ancestors on the left-hand side of the village, and an altar to the local gods of grain and fertility on the right-hand side. Both are protected and over-shadowed by a great banyan tree. The traditional view is that the village clan grows up from its roots in the village soil, like the dense leaves of the banyan tree, and, like those leaves, is happy in due course to fall to nourish these roots. With beautiful natural sceneries, rich humanity landscape and unique tourism spots, such as the state AAAA grade turism spot the Liyuan Garden, “the shocking art corridor of architecture” Diaolou, Kaiping City was awarded the “Excellent Tourism City of China” and the “State Garden City “ by the state.


village in Kaiping-2

Usually the village follows the Feng Shui principal to have a pond or river in the front, surrounding the entire village are lots of bamboo trees. Beyond are the rice fields and vegetable plots of the villagers. The Diaolou and dwelling houses stand in the field of vegetation and waters, which formed an excellent cultural landscape.


Kaiping Downtown and Tanjiang River