Work
A Pictorial History of Chinese Architecture
Explore in the Atlas →Written in English in wartime refuge at Lizhuang, Sichuan, in the 1940s; drawings lost and recovered only in 1980; published by MIT Press in 1984, edited by Wilma Fairbank. Constructed a periodisation (Tang–Liao–Song classical; Yuan–Ming–Qing late), a structural vocabulary (the dougong bracket-set as the Chinese order) and a field-survey-plus-textual-decoding method — founding Chinese architectural history.
Heritage Tectonics Knowledge
Details
- Type
- Text
- Location
- Cambridge, MA
Connections
- articulates Yingzao Fashi Building Standards
Referenced by
- Liang Sicheng 梁思成 authored
Sources
- Liang Sicheng. A Pictorial History of Chinese Architecture. MIT Press, 1984.
Cite this entry
First published May 2026Last revised Jul 2026
CLAD. "A Pictorial History of Chinese Architecture." Atlas of Architectural Thought. CLAD, 2026. https://www.cl-ad.com.au/research/atlas/work/work-pictorial-history-chinese-architecture/. Accessed July 17, 2026.