The doors of China - English First

The heavy, brass-laden door in the warm, royal Chinese red replete with hardware in the shape of a dragon's face, opened mouth. Exterior and interior doors adorned with chūn lián or lucky word sign hung each Lunar New Year. Ornate metal gates securing interior doors on homes and businesses. The doors of China are as alluring and charming as those found in France or Greece.

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I arrived in China to teach English a few years ago. The more time I spent here the more I began to enjoy the architecture all around me (ancient, old, and contemporary), all of a sudden, I became immediately aware of and attracted to the doors. These vary by the buildings they are hung from, both functionally and decoratively. Some are fantastically traditional with a definite Asian look and feel, others are more ornate, with the feel of another world maybe with a European influence, and others are merely functional, yet with a certain beauty all their own.

The doors of the temples are most ornate and strong and solid. They are host to ornate hardware from hinges to handles. They seem to open to doors, upon doors, upon doors entering what feels at first into the temple, only to be taken by the path to another door that opens to a peaceful courtyard, then again to a quiet chamber, then again to a long once used meeting room, and perhaps finally to the temple where a statue of the deity is adorned with flowers and incense is burning.

Doors of homes from the village home to the multifloor villa, are a sign of welcome, well-worn and humble, or shiny and opulent. These set the tone as to what is on the other side which is wholly left to one's imagination. One could find a courtyard surrounded by a couple of buildings - a kitchen shack with wood burning oven and stone tables, maybe a building with a stone sink in front where clothes are washed and hung to dry, and then the family sleeping quarters that may also include a sort of living room area and a place for the family to share a meal.

My personal favorites are the ancient and older doors, and those opening to a humble dwelling that showcases the life happening beyond the doors; the lives being lived daily, perhaps having held multiple generations of family. Awe, if only the doors and entryways could talk, surely the stories they would tell us.

Goto Chaoda to know more.

The main entrances to ancient palaces temples and mansions have doors with studs arranged in rows. Like other decorations on traditional buildings, the studs served to indicate ranks in the feudal hierarchy. Door studs go back a long time in history. To keep off aggression, heavy city gates were built and braced on the surface with iron plates, which were fastened or by means of studs. This system lasted for thousands of years.

The door studs on the gates of the Forbidden City were made of brass and plated with gold. Lustrous, they add to the splendor and magnificence of the imperial palace. All the gates used by the emperor have 9 X 9 or 81 studs, as the number nine represented the supremacy of the monarch. Other titled personages, princes and barons had fewer studs on their gates, such as 9 rows 7 each, 7 x 7 or 5 X 5; those who had lower ranks had studs made of iron.

An interesting question arises with regard to the Donghuamen gate of the Forbidden City which unlike the other principal entrances with 72 studs instead of the usual 81. The explanation lies in a historic event. At the end of the Ming Dynasty, the capital fell to Li Zicheng, leader of a famous peasant revolt in . And it was by Donghuamen that Chongzhen the last Ming emperor left the palace and then hanged himself at Jingshan (Hill of Prospect, popularly known as Coal Hill). The Qing house which replaced the Ming regarded Donghuamen as inauspicious, decided to use it for the exit of imperial hearses and cut down the number of its studs at the same time.

For more information, please visit China wooden doors.