Beijing

The Forbidden City, or Palace Museum, sits at the center of Beijing, directly north of Tiananmen Square. It was the imperial seat for the 24 Ming and Qing dynasty emperors from 1420 until 1912 when the last emperor, Pu Yi, abdicated. As the world's largest surviving palace complex, the Forbidden City is the ideal place to explore the imperial history and culture of China! Built from 1406 to 1420, the complex consists of 980 surviving buildings with 8,707 bays of rooms and covers 720,000 square metres (7,800,000 square feet). The Forbidden City was declared a World Heritage Site in 1987, and is listed by UNESCO as the largest collection of preserved ancient wooden structures in the world.