The campus of Shenyang Jianzhu University in Shenyang, Liaoning Province is ablaze with autumn colors. International students from countries, such as Chad, Russia, Senegal, Kazakhstan, and Burkina Faso, visited this university’s ancient building complexes and architecture museum, admiring the exquisite traditional Chinese architecture while learning about unique Chinese architectural techniques.

In recent years, Shenyang Jianzhu University has relocated and rebuilt several ancient building complexes that were to be demolished during urban development but still have historical and cultural value. These ancient building complexes include Huizhou-style residences relocated from Shexian County, Anhui Province, and the Shiwang Palace Complex, a northeastern Chinese-style building complex relocated from the back alley of North Zhongjie Street.

The Architecture Museum of Shenyang Jianzhu University is the largest comprehensive architectural museum among universities in China, and has won the Silver Prize of the China Architectural Design Award. The museum features six main exhibition areas, including a grand view of Chinese and foreign architecture, a collection of residential architecture, and masterpieces of Chinese architecture. Evgenia, an international student from Kazakhstan, showed particular interest in the ancient Chinese architectural models of the museum. She closely observed the mortise and tenon joint structures, saying, “Mortise and tenon joint structures are a representative technique in traditional Chinese architecture, embodying the wisdom of the ancient Chinese.”

Laurent, an international student from Chad, came to study at Shenyang Jianzhu University to pursue his passion for ancient Chinese architecture. He said, “The ancient building complexes and architecture museum on campus are our second classrooms, providing us with an abundance of vivid samples for learning Chinese architectural techniques.”