Qiuxia Garden

This guide to Qiuxia Garden in Jiading follows three Ming-dynasty neighbors, Gong Hong, the Shen family, and the Jin family, each building a private garden of ponds and pavilions behind separate walls. It traces how rivalry and shifting fortunes eventually folded all three gardens, plus the local City God Temple grounds, into one enclosed space, protected as a historic site in 1962. Walk from the peach blossom pond toward Ningxiage, and you cross, unmarked, from one family's ambition into a rival's.