Design Inspiration – Yin Yu Tang

My husband and I made a quick dash out of town last weekend before the holiday madness descends, and skiing commands all of our attention. One of our stops was Yin Yu Tang, the two hundred year old restored Chinese house at The Peabody Essex Museum in Salem, Massachusetts.

Yin Yu Tang is a stately sixteen-bedroom courtyard house from China’s southeastern Huizhou region that was dismantled and moved to the U.S. The house arrived in Massachusetts in thousands of wooden and stone pieces, many in sad disrepair – all tagged with Chinese characters. My husband, an architectural preservationist, was part of a team that spent over three years putting the puzzle back together, painstakingly restoring the intricate timber frame structure and wooden details. For him, visiting the house is like visiting an old friend he knows intimately.

It was impossible, as the wife of someone working on such an immense endeavor, not be lured into it the excitement of it. Dinner conversations revolved around its progress and challenges. I met and became friends with my husband’s co-workers and started reading Chinese literature and history. I traveled back and forth between Vermont and Massachusetts to visit him during the reconstruction and was fortunate to see many phases of Yin Yu Tang’s rebirth.

Standing again in Yin Yu Tang’s courtyard I was awed by the immensity of the undertaking and by it’s unequivocal multi-layered success. I was looking forward to taking pictures, but found that no cameras are allowed. The pictures here are some that I took before the house was open to the public (and before digital cameras were much good), but they’ll give you an idea of what a special place this is. If you get the opportunity, you should really see it for yourself. This is the gem in The Peabody Essex Museum’s crown, but other the exhibits are a treasure trove for designers and non-designers alike.