The Shi Xingmin Residence in Camel Mountain Village

The Shi Xingmin Residence in Camel Mountain Village

Due to the constraints of the mountainous terrain, Miao ethnic dwellings located deep in the mountains have adopted flexible and adaptive construction methods. The Shi Xingmin residence in Camel Mountain Village, Fenghuang County, is a typical example. Restricted by the site’s topography, the house is very small in scale. The main building and the stilted structure are set at an obtuse angle, and the front courtyard is paved with stacked stones, forming a natural fan-shaped layout. The courtyard walls and the entrance gate are arranged in a curved formation, with the gate and the main house inside the courtyard oriented in different directions. The entire courtyard and building are flexibly arranged according to the terrain, creating a rich and free spatial composition.

The main building has three bays in width. The central bay is set back inward, creating a “swallow mouth” at the entrance. The main door is located in the center of the swallow mouth, with a side door on each side. There are no internal partitions, resulting in a smooth, open interior space. Although there are no partitions, making it seem as though there is no clear distinction between the main hall, bedroom, and kitchen, the functional areas are actually well defined. As is typical, the middle bay serves as the main hall, used for daily living, household work, resting, and receiving guests. At the rear of the left bay is a bed, the middle section has a hearth, and the front is generally used as a storage area. The right bay functions as the kitchen, equipped with a stove and other necessary kitchen facilities. There are no walls separating the three bays, but a small wooden partition separates the sleeping areas at the rear of the side bays from the central main hall. Additionally, only the sleeping areas typically have wooden flooring, while the rest of the floor is not boarded. Since there are no room dividers, thick black curtains—completely opaque—are hung year-round over the beds to ensure a degree of privacy.

The stilted structure is used only as auxiliary space, with a hip-and-gable roof covered in small blue tiles. Due to the unique terrain, wooden columns cannot be used to elevate the structure, so it is built on earthen and stone platforms and surrounded by walls, resulting in a distinctive style.

The entire building is a composite structure of earth, stone, and wood, featuring wooden columns and frames, stone walls, and earthen perimeter walls. The earthen and stone walls are quite thick, typically 40–50 centimeters, but they are non-load-bearing. This reflects a common feature of traditional Chinese wooden architecture—the principle of clear separation between load-bearing and enclosing structures—where “the walls may collapse but the house will not fall.” The wooden frame supports the roof, while the walls serve only as enclosures. The most distinctive aspect is its framework, where diagonal beams are added on top of the traditional post-and-lintel wooden frame. These diagonal beams rest atop the columns and short columns (dougu), extending from the ridge all the way to the eaves. The purlins are placed on the diagonal beams rather than directly on the columns or dougu. As a result, the purlins above the diagonal beams and the columns or dougu below them do not need to align one-to-one, allowing for an extremely flexible roof truss design—this is the most distinctive feature of the Shi Xingmin Residence.