A special treasure within the Botanical Garden is the Chinese Garden Qian Yuan, a classical southern Chinese scholar's garden donated to the Ruhr University in 1990 by our partner university, the Tongji University of Shanghai.
When this fragile construction turned out to have suffered severe damage from our harsh climate within a few years, the Chinese Garden Society was founded in 2000 to prevent the imminent razing of the building and to collect donations for its renovation. After the Garden was reopened in October 2001 the Society remained in existence and now pursues two important goals:
- to keep an eye open for new structural damage and to organize and assist in financing necessary repairs and maintenance work in coordination and cooperation with the Botanical Garden;
- to acquaint the public with the Chinese Garden and its affairs by means of guided tours and other cultural events.
The Coronavirus Pandemic
The Botanical Garden and with it the Chinese Garden have recently reopened to the public, although with restrictions. The gardens can be visited on Mondays through Saturdays from 10am until 4 pm, but they are closed on Sundays! The Botanical Garden is accessible only via the northeast entrance (next to the maintenance yard).
Because the corridors in the Chinese Garden are so narrow it is difficult to maintain social distancing. To relieve this problem a one-way system has been set up for visiting the Chinese Garden. Access is possible only via the usual, main entrance to the Chinese Garden. After you have passed through the first pavilion you have the choice of continuing by the right-hand path or turning left, and then you can leave the garden only via the rear entrance near the rustic landing (the "boathouse"). A complete circuit is not allowed; to see the entire garden you must pass through twice, once on the right, once on the left.
Guided Tours
In ordinary times, on the third Saturdays of the summer months May through August we have been offering public guided tours of the Chinese Garden lasting about an hour, during which our guides explain the symbolism of the garden and its elements within the framework of Chinese philosophy. But because of the coronavirus pandemic we unfortunately must take leave of this program this year. The Chinese Garden is so cramped that social distancing would hardly be possible, unless the groups were very small and the garden was closed to other visitors.
Under these circumstances public guided tours would put a severe restraint on visits to the Chinese Garden while benefiting very few people. For this reason we are cancelling the tours this year, but that is only a postponement. We hope that next year we will again be able to offer the full program of guided tours in the accustomed manner.
Important Notice about our Contact Address
In the future please use our recently changed contact address given in the right-hand column at the Botanical Garden of the RUB. We wish to thank the Society of Friends of the Ruhr University for their assistance over many years in the past.
Flyer
Our flyer about the Chinese Garden and the Society (unfortunately only available in German) was last updated in 2014. You can download it below and either read it on the screen or print it out double-sided on a DIN A4 sheet and fold it into thirds parallel to the shorter side to obtain the original format.
To comply with the European General Data Protection Regulation, the membership application contained in the flyer can no longer be accepted. If you would like to become a member (which would please us very much), please download the current version, in German, via the link in the right-hand column.
