After leaving the architecturally distinctive Hall of Mirrors, I searched for other noteworthy palace designs. Though I complained that the rooms became monotonous after a while, there were still worthwhile details to catch.

Enfilade is an architectural design pattern where a series of rooms are formally aligned, and the doors of connecting rooms form a single axis. Thus, looking through a doorway, you see other doorways in succession. This kind of design is popular in European palaces.

Interestingly, enfilades are not considered good design in Feng Shui, a Chinese design philosophy. If I remember correctly, the Chi energy moves through too quickly when the doorways are aligned.

Though this enfilade isn’t very long, the ornate marble work makes it interesting. Some of the main hallways through the royal bedrooms have long enfilades, but there were too many people to see the architectural design. Only when I shot in less crowded areas could I effectively document this kind of detail.

This is the most impressive enfilade I documented. I counted six doorways, which I compressed slightly using a 54mm equivalent.

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