With a history dating back to 620 AD, Anren Ancient is regarded as one Chinese Historic & Cultural Town and National Key Town. It is also called the Town of Chinese Museums because it enjoys more than 40 old mansions and more than 30 museums, among which Liu’s Manor, Jianchuan Museum Cluster and mansions in three ancients streets are most famous. Featured architectures involving solemnity, elegance and appropriateness make Anren Ancient Town the Cultural Essence of Architecture in Western Sichuan.
Best Xiling Snow Mountain Tour with Anren Ancient Town:
>> 4 Days Chengdu & Xiling Snow Mountain with Anren Ancient Town
Entering Anren Ancient town, you will soon feel a strong antique flavor sent out from brick-wood buildings with grey tiles and paved roads. In the gardenized buildings, the symmetrical houses, winding corridors, waterside pavilions and rockeries are standing side by side. Most charming attractions are below.
Liu’s Manor contains former residence of the big landlord Liu Wencai in south area and his brother Liu Wenhui’s new mansion in north area. Nowadays, Liu’s Manor Museum is Liu Wencai’s former residence while Western Sichuan Folk-custom Museum refers to Liu Wenhui’s mansion.
Liu’s Manor Museum, is mainly made up of Xu Hall, Employers’ Hall, Living Scenes of Liu Wencai, Clay Sculptures of asking rents, and Cultural Treasure Hall where 20 thousand cultural relics and large amounts of literature information are kept. These collections combined with distinctive manor make a great contribution to learning and researching on the economy, culture, Sichuan warlord history and folklore in semi-colonial and semi-feudal China. In other words, Liu’s Manor Museum shows an epitome of old china or a section of the history of China social development.
Liu Wenhui’s Mansion, with a size of approximately 50 thousand square meters equivalent to five football fields, is the largest-scale mansion in the plentiful mansions. In fact, Liu Wenhui never lived there because the gorgeous mansion was built just to depict his high status. After national liberation, Liu Wenhui handed in his mansion to his government.
Covering an area of 500 mu, Jianchuan Museum Cluster (or Jianchuan Museum) is the largest folk museum in China invested by Mr. Fan Jianchuan. There are over 8 million collections here, including 404 Class-One National Treasures. With the theme of “collecting warfare for peace, collecting lesson for future, collecting disaster for stabilization and collecting folk-custom for inheriting”, Jianchuan Museum Cluster is hailed as National 4A Scenic Spot, Patriotism Education Base, National Culture Industry Demonstration Base and Forest Park of Relics and Museum. What’s more, Log Angeles Times even praised it as an example of “the increasing openness about the way recent history is viewed in China”
Jianchuan Museum Cluster is composed of more than 30 museums with four thematic sets including Second Sino-Japanese War (1937-1945), the “Red Era”, the Wenchuan Earthquake, and Folklore & Culture. Here you can have a glance of historic development and vicissitude of Chinese society.
Next to the museums lies old town with three ancient streets-Shuren Street, Yumin Street and Hongxing Street built in the period of Republic of China.
After the establishment of Private Wencai Middle School (Anren Middle School today) in 1945, Liu Wencai and his subordinates constructed a street called Shuren Street (Shuren means cultivating talents) near this school. It used to be an “Officer Street” because 8 officers once built their mansions or shops here. Lined with enough mansions and 78 shops, Shuren Street is also regarded as authentic “Mansion Street”.
Constructed in 1939 and funded by Liu Wencai exclusively, Yumin Street (Yumin means enriching the people) was equipped with tea house, theater, eastern style buildings as well as marketplace for rice and pigs.
With a full length of 260 m, Hongxing Street includes 98 shops and is divided into two parts. The shops in northern belong to Liu Wenzhao while others are in the charge of Liu Wencai. Hongxing Street was called Weixing Street originally because Liu Wenzhao and Liu Wencai were also respectively Weisan and Xingting.
Cui Yongyuan Film Legend Museum is situated in Liu Wenhui’s mansion and it covers four major functions of basic exhibition, films showing, interactions and leisure and film research. The legend of one-hundred-year film history and unique charm of film are incarnated in Mr. Cui’s collections. Rather than simple exhibition, this Museum adds high-tech elements to 12 halls with different themes and endows pleasure to teaching.
Abundant projectors, copies, professional books and magazines etc. are displayed in the Old Film Museum. Most precious treasure in the museum is zoetrope - Krupp projector which once plays for Empress Dowager Cixi.
Located in Heming County within a drive of 30 min from Anren Ancient Town, Heming Mountain is a Taoist mountain whose shape looks like a red-crowned crane. It is said that many Taoist monks strived for immortality here and several emperors like Jia Jing emperor came here to worship ancestors. Being covered with luxuriant trees and surrounded by flowing stream, Heming Mountain is a tourist attraction to explore Taoism as well as appreciate natural beauty.
>> 4 Days Chengdu & Xiling Snow Mountain with Anren Ancient Town
Anren Ancient Town is located Dayi County in the west of Chengdu Plain.
Private Tour (Top Recommended)
If you want to get rid of hustle of public transportation and troublesome navigation, you can book a private tour package which covers sightseeing, dining and transfer from us. Our local tour guide and driver will escort you to Anren Ancient Town with speed and convenience, and take care of all the details. You just need to focus on sightseeing.
Independent Travel
You need to take a public bus to Shiyangchang Station or Xinnanmen Station first and then take a bus to Anren Ancient Town .
SPOT | Liu’s Manor Museum | Jianchuan Museum Cluster | Liu Wenhui’s Mansion | Cui Yongyuan’s Film Museum | Museum Cluster in Ancient Street |
ADMISSION | 40 RMB | 100 RMB | 20 RMB | 30 RMB | 20 RMB |
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