Travel By Photo – SongMeiLing Villa, Nanjing

After our lunch at the silk factory, we left SuZhou for another significant city of ancient China, Nanjing. We went to Nanjing on our 5th day of packaged travel to China, of course, by couch. It only took us about one and a half hours to reach there since Nanjing is next to SuZhou. However, in terms of people, culture, language and architecture, both cities are like worlds apart. While Suzhou people are soft spoken and nice, Nanjing people are harsh and straight forward; While Suzhou city represents the ancient chinese’ poetry and humanity, Nanjing city represents ancient chinese’ greatness in power and capital of old chinese kingdom; While Suzhou is famous of its natural beauty, Nanjing is the city full with heritage architecture.

We realised these when we first met our local tour leader from Nanjing, Xiao Zhang. He would lead us to all itineraries in Nanjing, including factories! 🙁 Our first stop in Nanjing was Song MeiLing Villa, the getaway home of Mr. and Mrs. Chiang Kai Shek which was named after Mrs. Chiang, Song Meiling. In case Chiang Kai Shek is not familiar with you, he was the president of Republic Of China and Director General of Kuomintang, after Sun Yat-Sen, who overthrown the manchu Qing Dynasty of ancient China.

Why is it so popular? Locaed at No. 9 Zhongshan Ling, South Side of Purple Mountain in Nanjing, it was one of the most prestigious and grand architecture in the 30’s in China and was designed by Ms. Song Meiling herself, combining both the eastern and western elements. The late Song Meiling was the youngest among the three legendary Song’s sister. She was so passionate into pearls that the overall layout of the villa’s compound resembled the shape of a pearl necklace!

Being the first lady of Republic Of China, Song Meiling drove this Buick. It has also revealed the close relationship between her and the American. She has early education in US and was graduated with honour in US’s Wellesley College.

Hopefully I won’t be caught by infringing any copyright issues here as I’m going to show you photos of the interior of the villa. Looking at the wall painting and the furniture, you could see that Song Meiling was follower in christianity and unique western design elements have been brought into this eastern architecture villa.

This is the bathroom of the lady owner who used pure white British imported sanitary fittings which was rare during the 30’s, if not unprecedented. And Ms. Song is believed to take milk bath everyday here… 🙂

Though we were blocked from getting up-close to her private section, you still could see her photo on the table….

This is the study room of Mr. Chiang Kai Shek. Don’t be fooled by the photo hung on the wall as it is the portrait of Mr. Sun Yat Sen but not Chiang, the owner.

Here was the dining hall with a table for four. What? Where the 5th guy is going to sit if Chiang and Song decided to treat more than 2 guests?

Song MeiLing villa was used to be the official residence of the president of Kuomintang before it became the getaway home of Chiang and Song and the villa being renamed. Meeting room was therefore essential in the villa as well as the photo of the founder of Chinese nationalist movement, Mr. Sun Yat Shen.

On the upper floor, there is a huge courtyard with outdoor tables and chairs for the owners to admire the beauty of scenery and greenery surrounding the villa.

During the sunset as we were there, the twilight has made me crazy to fire my Panasonic Lumix FZ28 none-stop. You could imagine how anyone would feel in this breezing dusk…

Song Meiling loves 2 things in her life: one is pearl and the other one is PiQiu (貔貅), a lion like legendary animal which is believed can bring good luck anf fortune to owner. Her passion into piqiu was clearly evident in this piqiu shaped dustbin.

I just love the wild colour of Song Meiling Villa in sunset… 🙂

Piqiu, lion, dragon and Chiling statues are crafted and placed at all corners of the villa as well as on the chinese ancient roof architecture, contrasting to the western influenced interior of the villa.

What a magnificent travel destination! Song Meiling Villa is classified as heritage architecture by the Chinese government in year 2001 and has since become one of the latest and popular travel site in Nanjing. We visited it during our travel to Nanjing and we left an hour later for another important infrastructure of the city, Nanjing Bridge. – Travel Feeder.

All photos above were captured with Panasonic Lumix FZ28

About The Author

Cecil Lee

The author is an avid traveler and photography hobbyist who loves to share with others his travel and photo-taking experience in many popular tourist destinations around Europe, Asia and Australasia. Read the exciting stories with many photos captured on his journeys.