方塔园
Song dynasty brick and timber pagoda whose sealed reliquary yielded a monk's remains after nine centuries.
Location
About this audio guide
This guide to 方塔园 in Shanghai centers on a nine-story pagoda in Songjiang, raised in the late eleventh century as the last trace of a vanished temple. It opens with restoration workers in the nineteen seventies prying open a vault sealed for centuries, and follows the canal town's rise as a link between Hangzhou and Suzhou. You'll also hear how the 1980 garden around the tower was assembled from rescued halls of old Songjiang. Look up at the timber eaves and brick core before stepping inside.
This audio guide was created using AI.
Similar places
Longhua Pagoda
Octagonal Song-dynasty brick pagoda of seven storeys, saved from demolition by locals during the Cultural Revolution.
Longhua Temple
Ancient Buddhist temple with a leaning brick pagoda, beside grounds where revolutionary martyrs were once executed.
Jing'an Temple
Gilded-roof Buddhist temple complex on a busy shopping street, with a massive white jade Buddha.
Jade Buddha Temple
Nineteenth-century Buddhist monastery housing a solid white jade Buddha carried from Burma by a lone monk.
Dajing Ge Pavilion
Surviving fragment of a Ming-dynasty city wall, crowned by a three-story pavilion shrine to the god of war.
Shanghai Zhujiajiao Ancient Town Tourist Zone
Canal-lined water town of stone bridges and Ming and Qing houses along boat-filled waterways.