Potala Square

The Potala Palace, on the Red Hill (Marpori) above the Lhasa valley floor, is the most recognisable architectural image of Tibet — a 13-storey palace complex of red and white masonry rising 117 metres from the hilltop, visible from across the Lhasa plain. The current building was constructed primarily by the fifth Dalai Lama from 1645, incorporating earlier structures on the site associated with the 7th-century King Songtsen Gampo.

The palace served as the winter residence of successive Dalai Lamas and the administrative and religious centre of the Tibetan government until the flight of the 14th Dalai Lama in 1959. The interior contains a sequence of throne rooms, chapels, libraries, and the golden chortens (burial stupas) of eight Dalai Lamas — extensive decorative programmes of thangka paintings, carved woodwork, and accumulated votive offerings spanning three centuries.

Access is strictly limited — approximately 2,300 visitors per day are admitted, with bookings required in advance and timed entry enforced to protect the structure. The visit route moves through the White Palace (living quarters) and Red Palace (religious halls) and exits on the rear of the hill; the entire circuit takes approximately two hours at the prescribed pace.

Potala Square, constructed in 2002 to frame the palace in a formal civic composition, is one of the largest public squares in China. The scale is deliberately grand; the square's emptiness on ordinary days — when security restrictions limit public gathering — gives it a peculiar formal quality distinct from the religious intensity of the Barkhor a kilometre to the east.