The area around Ho Tay (West Lake) in Hanoi's Tay Ho district is home to a rich system of cultural heritages, ancient villages and traditional trade villages, along with various beautiful landscapes attached with famous legends, which all give it great potential in creative cultural space development serving locals and tourists.

Around the lake is a system of 20 historical relic sites carrying a deep imprint of the Thang Long Imperial Citadel, including Tran Quoc Pagoda, Tay Ho Temple, and Dong Co Temple, along with traditional craft villages of Yen Thai, Nhat Tan, Tu Lien, Quang An, and Phu Thuong.

Thanks to its strengths in culture and landscapes, Tay Ho has seen the development of many cultural spaces.

Nhat Tan area is famous for peach blossom gardens in Spring, while Ho Tay flower valley has become popular among visitors all year round, and Ho Tay lotus ponds are always attractive to visitors in summer. The lake itself has its unique beauty at anytime around the year.

In order to exploit the cultural values and landscapes around Ho Tay to meet the entertainment demands of locals and visitors, Tay Ho district authorities have built a pedestrian space on Trinh Cong Son street, which has become a convergence of cultural and artistic activities and a place to popularise the typical cuisine of Tay Ho district and Hanoi to visitors.

Chairman of the Tay Ho People’s Committee Nguyen Dinh Khuyen said that the district is focusing on building its typical creative cultural spaces not only for entertainment purpose but also for optimising its resources and advantages.

Once formed, the spaces will comprehensively bring into play the ecosystem of the area, especially its historical values, to serve residents of the capital city and visitors. The district has defined cultural and historical values as the foundation for the development of creative cultural spaces of the district, together with typical characteristics of the area.

This is also a way the district has chosen to preserve and promote its cultural values, thus attracting more tourists in the future.

Alongside, Tay Ho authorities are also concentrating on designing plans of historical relic sites in the locality in parallel with preserving and restoring the sites in order to protect and optimise the values of the destinations.

The creative spaces being built in close association with heritages, including the one to perform Tam Phu Mother Goddess worshipping rituals of Vietnamese people at Tay Ho Temple, the one to experience the craft of making “Do” paper in Yen Thai, and another to practice the craft of making Phu Thuong steamed sticky rice in Phu Gia temple historical site.

Meanwhile, a number of parks in the area will be upgraded with contemporary designs, guaranteeing that the heritage values are preserved and promoted, and the demand of locals for civilised, harmonious and high quality spaces met at the same time.

District authorities have also proposed upgrading Ly Tu Trong Park in combination with the construction of Tay Ho Book Park, along with the upgrade of two old villas to become an information-service points of the district and the city.

Particularly, Tay Ho district will connect local destinations and cultural relic sites to make complete tours in combination with spiritual tourism, green tourism, experience tourism and night tourism.

It also aims to turn the alluvial area along the Red River into an entertainment space for camping lovers.

According to leaders of the district, the building of creative cultural spaces will meet the demand to enjoy the culture of the people, making the district more attractive and inspiring people’s responsibility to protect historical and cultural values./. VNA