What is the structure of Beijing courtyard house building?

The courtyard system of bungalow houses is a traditional form of residential housing in the old city of Beijing. The formal courtyard is a rectangular courtyard, facing south, long from north to south, and narrow from east to west. However, due to the limitations of the location of streets and lanes and the topography, there are many siheyuan that do not conform to the norms. Some courtyards have a wall instead of a house on the south side, and such courtyards can only be called triple courtyards.

The houses in Beijing's siheyuan are constructed of brick and wood, with thick wood for the columns, beams erected on top of the columns, and five to seven thick wood for the purlins on the raised beams on both sides, forming a triangle, and thinner wooden rafters laid between the upper and lower purlins, and then roof tiles were laid on top of the rafters. Bricks are used to build the mountain wall and the back wall of the house, the lower half of the front wall is built, and the upper half is made of wood for the window frames; the windows are made of windowpaper paste, which provides better light and ventilation, and a door is opened in the center of the front wall.

The houses in the countryside usually have only the main house facing south, and some of the houses on the east and west sides of the main house are built as small rooms for piling up grain, agricultural tools and sundries, which can also be used for living. Most of them have courtyard walls made of broken bricks or adobe, as well as fences made of wood straw.

Beijing City, whether it is a deep house or rural houses have to set up walls, most of these walls play a defensive, protective role.

The house wall replaces the courtyard wall in the courtyard, which strengthens the closure of the whole courtyard. But after all, only a quarter of the main house is well oriented, warm in winter and cool in summer, and the other houses have relatively poor lighting and heating. The south house seldom sees the sun, the east room is not cool in summer and not warm in winter, and the west room is hotter in summer, although it does not get the northwest wind in winter.

The standard courtyard house is generally located on the north side of an east-west hutong, north-south length of about 8 zhang, east-west width of about 5 zhang, the mansion of the southeast corner of the gate.

The gate has a house door and wall door and other styles.

The area of the house door is about a room, with a roof, the gate door is installed in the middle of the columns on the seam is called Guangliang gate, you can enter the carriage, this door is generally used by the dignitaries of the deep house.

The door is installed in the gable column is called "Ruyimen", not very tall, but the number is more, the general residential use of this door.

The wall gate, the lowest gate, has a gatehouse, just above the gatehouse to make a small roof.

Jinju gate also belongs to the house-style gate, with a door frame in the place of the jinju. Those that are only half an inch wide are called narrow gates, and those with door frames installed in the position of the front gable pillars are called barbarian gates.

Yankee-style gate is a recent development, the top of the door in the middle of the rectangle or triangle, on both sides of the squatting lion, or a pair of flower baskets, the wall is carved with Western-style patterns.

The courtyard is generally black door, oil green door, wide bright door frame is equipped with the root of the door pillow stone, drum stone, inside and outside the door are equipped with shadow wall. Ordinary small doors and courtyards of the shadow wall is to meet the door of the house mountain wall.

After entering the gate, you are greeted by a brick shadow wall, also on both sides are shadow walls, the left side is opened with a round moon gate, the door has four green screen doors, usually only open the middle two.

Walking into this door, we came to the outer courtyard, the left from east to west is a row of five southern rooms, the gatehouse is the easternmost one, the rest of the rooms or for the reception of guests in the living room, or the master's study, or used to pile up miscellaneous goods, but also for the servants' housing.

The courtyard in front of the house is not big, through the hanging flower gate in the center of the courtyard wall north of the south house, turn to the left and right and go down the steps into the inner courtyard.

The inner courtyard is a square courtyard, consisting of the main room, the two sides of the ear room, compartment, each room in front of a copy of the corridor connected.

The main room of a standard courtyard is three rooms, the east and west rooms are also three rooms each, and there are two ear rooms on each side of the main room. Between the hanging flower gate and the main house, and between the east and west rooms, there is a paved road in the shape of a cross, and the empty space on the cross road can be used for planting trees, flowers and fish tanks.

Some courtyards also have a backyard, generally used as a kitchen and toilet. There are also storerooms and servants live, collectively known as the back of the house.

In fact, the courtyard is not exactly the standard form. There are many different variations depending on the size of the plot, shape, location, family size, and financial resources for building the house.

The courtyard of a small civilian family has only three rooms, two rooms in the east and two rooms in the west, and two inverted rooms, and some of them do not even have inverted rooms.

The big courtyard has seven north rooms, in addition to three main rooms, two ear rooms in the east and west, and seven south rooms. The larger courtyard has even more main rooms, but they are not for the average person.

The deep houses in Beijing are made up of several siheyuan (courtyard houses) that form a two- and three-entry courtyard pattern. In the middle is the main courtyard, east and west side can also build cross courtyard, side courtyard, thus forming a courtyard group.