Elegant Tour of Poetry and Painting: Research on Plan Restoration of Xu’s East Garden in Nanjing in Ming Dynasty

Xu’s East Garden is one of the most famous gardens in Nanjing in the middle and late Ming Dynasty. The transformation process from the agricultural garden to the landscape garden reflects the development trend of gardens in the Jiangnan Region. However, the depth of existing research does not match the historical position of the garden mainly due to a scarcity of historical data. Based on existing historical materials, this research aims to clarify the boundary of East Garden through the in-depth excavation, identification, and combination of historical materials such as garden notes, garden paintings and local images. Besides, the research extracts landscaping elements and intentions from garden poems written by the friends of the garden’s owner to verify and restore the plan of the garden in its heyday. The research reveals that the boundary of East Garden is defined by Long Bridge, Yuanjia Bridge, Small Canal, Majia Bridge and Moli Garden. The Yijian Hall in the garden is a two-story building, facing southeast; East Garden is rich in landscaping elements, among which the building elements include gorgeous halls and pavilions, plant elements include exotic flowers and trees, rock elements include peaks, caves and stone forests, and water elements include streams, ponds, cascades and springs; the construction of the garden adopts a natural water management method and a landscaping technique featuring the combination of hall and terrace; the elegant gathering of poems and paintings makes East Garden a significant cultural space in Nanjing in the middle and late Ming Dynasty. The research supplements existing historical materials involved in the research on the garden cluster of Xu’s family, in hope of providing reference for similar research.