My visit to Liangzhu started at the museum, located in a building designed by David Chipperfield architects - it seems that companies like these thrive on the construction booms of China and the Gulf states. This building too must have cost a small fortune. It lies within a pretty landscaped garden setting with a manmade lake, probably referencing the Liangzhu civilization's wetland origins.

The exhibition experience wasn't so pleasant due to the large school groups roaming around. Overall the building comprises more empty space than original exhibits, but it holds the jade grave objects that were taken from the site and some interesting pottery displaying primitive written characters (the Liangzhu culture had no script but they were getting there!). The best thing I found was the 3d video performance, which much more clearly than the nomination file explains the nature of Liangzhu: how its people ‘tamed’ the wetlands by buildings dams and turned it into a liveable city with stilt houses and people navigating around by wooden boats. It reminded me a bit of Xochimilco, but that may have been blurred by the Native American feel of how the ritual acts (by people with feathered headdresses) are displayed.

The archeological site also starts with a wetland theme - you can clearly see the natural state of this area when you enter the area on foot. As others have noted it’s quite a hike to the main historical area (the palace area) and it’s all unshaded. I walked for 6km in total and got the shuttle back to the entrance. Seeing the manmade platforms of rammed earth made me think back to the 3 ‘mound’ WHS in the US which I visited last year. At the back of the ‘Pile dwelling mound’ lies the Fanshan Royal Cemetery- this was the royal burial ground where the most exquisite jade objects were found.

Overall, I didn’t enjoy Liangzhu as much as similar Chinese sites such as Yin Xu or the Ancient Shu TWHS. I did not find its found objects particularly memorable (you really must like jade to enjoy them) and the ‘Early City’ narrative (Liangzhu was contemporary with Mesopotamian cities like Ur) has only been known since 2007 when the full city structure was discovered.

Practicalities

Although many reviewers have already shared practical details below, the situation on site has changed again in 2024. Metro line 2 from Hangzhou still will bring you swiftly to Liangzhu subway station, where at the adjacent minibus station there now is bus 1222 that directly connects with the museum and archeological site. It’s a tourist bus, leaving every 20 minutes and stops are announced in English as well. You can pay for it (2 yuan) with a Hangzhou city bus ticket, which is easily available from the Alipay app Transport section. At the archeological site (the final stop) ticketing is now mostly done online (via an Alipay mini-app), but you can get a ticket as well at the desk showing your passport. The site entrance fee is 60 yuan + 20 yuan for using the electric shuttles.