Lan Su Garden Is for Lovers at Chinese Valentine’s Day Events

It’s Lan Su’s first programming since a fence went up to protect the Old Town garden from vandals.

Rainbow Bridge, image courtesy of Lan Su Chinese Garden Evening shot under the moonlight at Lan Su Chinese Garden (Scot)
By Rachel Saslow

Anyone in need of a slam-dunk date-night option this month, Lan Su Chinese Garden’s got you.

For two weekends in August, Lan Su will host its first-ever Qixi festival, also known as Chinese Valentine’s Day. Lovers can stroll the garden at night with live music and glowing lotus lanterns on the evenings of Aug. 16, 17, 23 and 24.

Venus Sun, Lan Su’s vice president of culture and community, says the inspiration for the summer night event came to her on a work trip last fall to Suzhou, a city outside of Shanghai known for its classical gardens. An evening event at the Master of the Nets Garden there included LED-illuminated hairpins, white lanterns and musical performances.

“It was beautiful and romantic,” Sun says. “We wanted to re-create that feeling here at Lan Su in Portland.”

The Chinese Valentine’s Day events will be the renowned botanical garden’s first major programming since working with city officials to install a chain-link fence around the garden Aug. 1. The fence is there to deter crime and protect the garden after multiple acts of vandalism this summer. Executive director Elizabeth Nye wrote to members Aug. 2 that she’d reported the vandalism as bias crimes and described it as “targeted.”

The Qixi (pronounced chee-shee) festival is based on the ancient Chinese folklore of star-crossed lovers Zhinü the weaver girl and Niulang the cowherd. The mother of Zhinü was so angry about their union that she drew a line with a hairpin between the two lovers that became the Milky Way. After that, they could only see each other once a year: on the seventh day of the seventh month of the lunar calendar, which this year falls on Aug. 10. Legend has it that a magical bridge of magpie birds forms across the Milky Way for Zhinu and Niulang to see each other for that one day.

At Lan Su, visitors are invited to write love messages on magpie-shaped notes that will eventually create the legendary Magpie Bridge as the event goes on. Yun Shui Teahouse will host a bar inside the garden. Calligraphers and artists will be available to customize paper fans.

GO: Summer Night’s Garden at Lan Su Chinese Garden, 239 NW Everett St., 503-228-8131, lansugarden.org. 7:30-9:30 pm Aug. 16, 17, 23 and 24. $10-$24.

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