JARDJournal of Architectural Research and Development2208-35292208-3537Bio-Byword Scientific Publishing Pty. Ltd.10.26689/JARD.v10i5.15655ArticleSoundscape Creation of the Lanzhou Yellow River Waterwheel Garden from the Perspective of Historical Soundscape Restorationhttps://artdesignp.com/journal/JARD/10/5/10.26689/JARD.v10i5.15655SunYichao20261052026-10-13Against the backdrop of rapid urbanization, the protection of heritage soundscapes faces severe challenges. As a typical water-conservancy heritage site in northwestern China, the Lanzhou Yellow River Waterwheel Garden has witnessed a decline in place recognition as historical sound sources—such as the mechanical sounds of waterwheels and boatmen’s work chants—have disappeared, and the sonic symbols that carry collective memory now confront a crisis of rupture. Current research on heritage soundscapes remains limited by insufficient attention to the cultural value of historical soundscapes and an overreliance on physical noise reduction in conservation methods. Taking the Lanzhou Yellow River Waterwheel Garden as its research object, this study employs documentary archaeology, oral history interviews, and acoustic measurement to uncover the elements of its historical soundscape and to diagnose the underlying causes of soundscape rupture, including the erasure of soundscapes in the physical environment, intergenerational gaps in cultural memory, and the absence of authenticity-maintenance mechanisms. The study proposes site-specific soundscape creation strategies and constructs a “soundscape–memory–space” model through low-tech interventions such as mortise-and-tenon transmission devices, pebble wind-chime arrays, and interactive soundscape node designs, thereby achieving the cultural translation of the historical soundscape and the restoration of the genius loci. This research offers a new pathway for the soundscape conservation of industrial heritage and provides a reference for the living inheritance of water-conservancy heritage in the Yellow River Basin.Soundscape creation, Yellow River Waterwheel Garden, Heritage conservation, Cultural memory, Low-tech intervention, Spatial narrative

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