Phuoc Tich Ancient Village

A remarkably intact 15th-century pottery village of timber ruong houses, mossy wells and banyan shrines looped by the O Lau River, about 40 kilometres north of Hue.

Phuoc Tich was founded in 1470 by settlers from the north and grew prosperous on pottery, supplying earthenware to the Nguyen court and to markets across the region. Its fortunes faded in the twentieth century, but that is precisely why the village survived: more than two dozen ruong houses, traditional timber homes with intricately carved frames, remain intact beneath old fruit trees, along with ancient wells, communal houses, shrines beneath banyan trees and the remains of the pottery kilns. In 2009 it became the second village in Vietnam to be listed as a national heritage site. A handful of families run homestays and serve home-cooked meals, potters have revived the craft on a small scale, and bicycles are available for a loop of the village and the riverbank. It is about an hour from the city by road and makes a peaceful overnight or a long half day for anyone interested in rural Vietnamese architecture.