West Lake is a shallow lake of about 6.5 km² on the western edge of Hangzhou, framed on three sides by wooded hills and crossed by two causeways built by the poet-governors Bai Juyi and Su Shi. Shaped by more than a thousand years of dredging, planting and building, it was inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List in 2011 as a cultural landscape.
- UNESCO World Heritage (cultural landscape) · 2011
- National scenic area · 1982
Key facts
Overview
West Lake is not a wild landscape but a made one. What began as a lagoon cut off from Hangzhou Bay became, through centuries of civic work, a reservoir, a garden and a stage for poetry. Its causeways, islands, pagodas and temples were placed to be looked at from each other, and the whole ensemble was named and framed as the Ten Scenes of West Lake in the Southern Song dynasty, when Hangzhou was the capital.
UNESCO describes it as having influenced garden design across China and in Japan and Korea over the centuries. For Hangzhou it is the city's centre of gravity: the old town sits on its eastern shore, and the hills to the west hold tea villages, temples and walking paths.
How the landscape formed
The lake occupies a former bay of the Qiantang estuary. Silt carried by the tides built up a sandbar that closed the bay off, perhaps in the first millennium BCE, leaving a lagoon fed by springs and streams from the surrounding hills. Left alone it would have silted up and become marsh; it survives because successive governors dredged it and used the spoil to build the causeways and islands. The lake is shallow, with an average depth of little more than two metres. The hills on the north, west and south are of sandstone and limestone, with karst caves such as those of the Feilai Feng near Lingyin Temple.
Highlights
Su Causeway
苏堤
A tree-lined causeway nearly 3 km long running north to south across the lake, built by Su Shi in 1090 from dredged mud, with six arched bridges.
Bai Causeway
白堤
The shorter causeway linking the city shore with Solitary Hill, named after the Tang governor-poet Bai Juyi.
Broken Bridge
断桥
The bridge at the eastern end of the Bai Causeway, where the lovers of the Legend of the White Snake meet.
Three Pools Mirroring the Moon
三潭印月
An island of ponds within the lake, with three small stone pagodas standing in the water offshore.
Solitary Hill
孤山
The largest natural island, home to the Xiling Seal Engravers' Society and the old imperial library pavilion.
Leifeng Pagoda
雷峰塔
Pagoda on the southern shore; the tenth-century tower collapsed in 1924 and a new one was built over its foundations in 2002.
Plants and wildlife
The lake is an urban water body kept clean by diverting water from the Qiantang River and by continuous management of its lotus beds and shoreline. The hills around it are wooded with evergreen broadleaf trees, camphor and bamboo, and the tea terraces of Longjing lie in their valleys.
Plants
Lotus
荷花
Lotus beds on the northern and western parts of the lake flower in July and August.
Sweet osmanthus
桂花
The city flower of Hangzhou, whose scent fills the Manjuelong valley in September and October.
Longjing tea
龙井茶
The green tea grown on the hills west of the lake, one of the most famous teas in China.
Wildlife
Mandarin duck
鸳鸯
Seen on the quieter inlets and around the islands, especially in winter.
Ornamental carp
锦鲤
The goldfish and carp of Viewing Fish at Flower Harbour, one of the Ten Scenes.
Culture and legend
West Lake is the most written-about lake in China. Bai Juyi governed Hangzhou in the 820s and Su Shi in the 1070s and 1090s; both left causeways and poems. The Southern Song court made the lake its pleasure ground, and painters of the period fixed the Ten Scenes as a canon. The Kangxi and Qianlong emperors visited repeatedly and wrote the names of the scenes on steles that still stand. The lake is also the setting of the Legend of the White Snake and of the tomb of the loyal general Yue Fei.
欲把西湖比西子，淡妆浓抹总相宜。Yù bǎ Xī Hú bǐ Xīzǐ, dàn zhuāng nóng mǒ zǒng xiāngyí.
“I would compare West Lake to the beauty Xi Shi: lightly or richly made up, she is always lovely.”
— Su Shi, “Drinking on the Lake as It Clears, Then Rains” (饮湖上初晴后雨), 1073
Ten Scenes of West Lake
西湖十景
The poetic canon of views fixed in the Southern Song, among them Spring Dawn at Su Causeway and Autumn Moon over the Calm Lake.
Lingyin Temple
灵隐寺
A Chan Buddhist monastery in the western hills, founded in the fourth century, facing the carved limestone cliffs of Feilai Feng.
Yue Fei Temple
岳王庙
Temple and tomb of the Southern Song general Yue Fei on the north-western shore.
Xiling Seal Engravers' Society
西泠印社
Founded on Solitary Hill in 1904, the leading society for the art of seal carving.
History
822–824
Bai Juyi governs Hangzhou
He builds a dyke to store lake water for irrigation and writes some of the best-known poems on the lake.
1090
Su Shi dredges the lake
The overgrown lake is cleared and the Su Causeway built from the spoil.
1138
Hangzhou becomes the Southern Song capital
Court patronage turns the lake into a designed landscape; the Ten Scenes are named.
1508
Yang Mengying dredges the lake
The Ming prefect restores the silted lake and builds the Yanggong Causeway along the western shore.
1924
Leifeng Pagoda collapses
The tenth-century pagoda falls; it is rebuilt over its foundations in 2002.
2011
UNESCO World Heritage
Inscribed as the West Lake Cultural Landscape of Hangzhou.
Through the seasons
Spring
Willows and peach blossom along the Su Causeway in March and April, the classic Spring Dawn scene; also the season of the first Longjing tea picking.
Summer
Hot and humid, with lotus in flower in July and August; early mornings and evenings on the lake are the most comfortable.
Autumn
Osmanthus scent in September and October and clear autumn light; the most pleasant season for walking the causeways.
Winter
Cool and often grey; on the rare snowy days the Broken Bridge scene of Lingering Snow is at its best.
Routes and ways in
Circuit of the lake
A walk or cycle of about 15 km around the whole shore, taking in both causeways, Solitary Hill and Leifeng Pagoda.
Su Causeway walk
North to south across the lake on foot, under willows and over six bridges.
Boat to the islands
Hand-rowed boats and small ferries cross to Three Pools Mirroring the Moon and the Mid-Lake Pavilion.
Western hills and tea villages
Paths from Lingyin Temple over the hills to the Longjing tea villages and the Nine Creeks and Eighteen Gullies.
Practical notes
- The lake shore is open public space integrated with the city, reached on foot from central Hangzhou.
- Public holidays bring very large crowds to the causeways; early morning is the quietest time.
- Cycling is allowed along much of the shore but not on every path; bicycle hire is widely available in the city.
Cities to start from
Frequently asked questions
Sources
- West Lake Cultural Landscape of Hangzhou — UNESCO World Heritage Centre (retrieved 27 September 2026)
- Zhejiang Provincial People's Government — Zhejiang Provincial People's Government (retrieved 27 September 2026)
- Hangzhou Municipal People's Government — Hangzhou Municipal People's Government (retrieved 27 September 2026)
More mountains and nature in Zhejiang
- Sacred mountainMount Putuo普陀山Guanyin's island in the Zhoushan archipelago
- LakeQiandao Lake千岛湖A reservoir of a thousand islands over drowned towns
- Nature reserve · 1,506 mTianmu Mountains天目山Giant cryptomerias, wild ginkgo and the mountain that named tenmoku
- MountainYandang Mountains雁荡山A collapsed volcano of rock pinnacles and long waterfalls
- LakeLake Tai太湖The great lake at the heart of the Yangtze Delta
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