The Forbidden City in Beijing is located in the center of Beijing's central axis and was the imperial palace of the Ming and Qing dynasties.

The construction began in the fourth year of Yongle (1406) in the Ming Dynasty and was completed in the eighteenth year of Yongle (1420). Covering an area of 720,000㎡ and a building area of 160,000㎡, it is the world's largest and best-preserved wooden palace complex.

The Forbidden City has four gates, the Meridian Gate in the south, the Gate of Divine Might(Shenwu Gate) in the north, the Donghua Gate in the east, and the Xihua Gate in the west. Each of the four corners of the city wall has a corner tower.

There is a folk saying that there are nine beams, eighteen columns, and seventy-two ridges, which describe the complexity of its structure. The buildings in the Forbidden City are divided into two parts: the Outer Court and the Inner Court.

The center of the Outer Court are the Hall of Supreme Harmony (Taihe Dian), the Hall of Central Harmony(Zhonghe Dian), and the Hall of Preserving Harmony(Baohe Dian), collectively referred to as the Three Halls, where the state holds grand ceremonies.

The left and right wings of the three main halls are supplemented by two groups of buildings, the Hall of Literary Glory and the Hall of Martial Valor.

The center of the Inner Court are the Palace of Heavenly Purity (Qianqing Dian), the Hall of Union(Jiaotai Dian), and the Palace of Earthly Tranquility (Kunning Dian), collectively referred to as the Three Halls of the Inner Court, which are the main palaces where the emperor and the queen live on the back of which is the Royal Garden.

There are six east and six west palaces on both sides of the three palaces at the Inner Court, which are the places where the imperial concubines live and rest.

On the east side of the East Six Palaces are Buddhist buildings such as Tianqiongbao Hall, and on the west side of the West Sixth Palace are buildings such as the Hall of Rectitude(Zhongzheng Dian). Outside the Outer Court and the Inner Court, there are two parts of the outer east road and the outer west road.

The Palace Museum, built based on the Forbidden City, is the largest museum of ancient culture and art in China. On October 10, 1925, the Palace Museum was officially established and opened to the public. In 1961, it was announced by the State Council as the first batch of national key cultural relics protection units. It was recognized as a "World Cultural Heritage" by UNESCO in 1987. Today, the Palace Museum has a complete system of cultural relics, covering collections from ancient to modern times, with excellent quality and rich categories.

The total number of existing collections has reached more than 1.8 million pieces (sets), mainly imperial cultural relics, ancient building collections, and book collections of the Ming and Qing dynasties. The collection is divided into 25 major categories, among which there are more than 8,000 first-class collections (sets), which can be called a treasure house of art.

Address: No. 4, Jingshan Front Street, Dongcheng District, Beijing