Des Moines Register
06-29-06
DM Asian garden gets major addition
By JEFFREY PATCH
REGISTER STAFF WRITER
Master technicians from China helped their American counterparts raise a wooden pavillion on a signature riverfront landmark today.
The components for the Chinese structure were crafted and assembled in Beijing and then shipped to Des Moines for the Robert D. Ray Asian Gardens.
“Everyone says, ‘Why are you doing this is Iowa?’” said
Paul Shao , the president of the Chinese Cultural Center of America. “I say, ‘Why not Iowa?’ I wanted to build something fit for emperors and kings.”
Shao, who is also a professor of architecture in the College of Design at
Iowa State University , said the garden building is the only Chinese Imperial style structure in the United States.
The wooden structure fits together using notches instead of nails or adhesive materials.
The project is due for completion Sept. 23 — a few days before Ray’s birthday
Sept. 26, although Shao said the garden is an ever-evolving entity.
“You can’t complete it in a few months,” he said. “It has to grow and mature.”
The structure is built inside a levy on the Des Moines River with the skyline and
Wells Fargo Arena in the background.
“People can experience China in real space and real time,” he said. “Through this experience people can contemplate the brotherhood and sisterhood of humankind and become one with nature.”
Iowa’s then-Gov. Robert Ray welcomed refugees from Southeast Asia, who were fleeing the turmoil of the Vietnam War, in the 1970s.
“It’s a one-of-a-kind monument to celebrate Iowa’s openness to diversity,” Shao said.
Ray also established a sister state partnership between Iowa and Hebei province in China and was one of the first governors to visit China after President Nixon’s landmark visit in 1972.

Three master technicians from the Landscape Architecture Corporation of China, a state-owned entity, are in Des Moines for a month to supervise construction of the facility.
Liu Jie, the project manager, Zhang Yanbao, the timber specialist and Lu
Jianguo, the tile specialist, worked for 10 years as apprentices and 10 years as technicians before earning the master technician title.
“These are things they don’t put down on paper,” Shao said. “They learn from generation to generation t o generation.”
Liu said Chinese architecture is vastly different from its American counterpart.
“Our structures are in the traditional Chinese way,” he said. “It’s mainly made of timber components. Chinese craftsman have to be engaged to carry out these buildings.”
The projects final cost is estimated at about $1.3 million.