In 1898 the Guangxu Emperor, led by a circle of advisers, attempted to introduce drastic reforms to bring China onto the path to modernity.

Liang Qichao quit his government post and initiated a social and literary movement to introduce modern, Western thought to Chinese society.

This time a more systematic and all-around curriculum was discreetly put forward, consisting of courses of fine arts, theory, history, science, and professional practice.

This plan incorporates contemporary American techniques in zoning, public administration, government finance, and municipal engineering.

[3] In 1931, Liang became a member of a newly developed organization in Beijing called the Society for Research in Chinese Architecture.

He felt a strong impulse to study Chinese traditional architecture and that it was his responsibility to interpret and convey its building methods.

Since the carpenters were generally illiterate, methods of construction were usually conveyed orally from master to apprentice and were regarded as secrets within every craft.

In spite of these difficulties, Liang started his research by "decoding" classical manuals and consulting the workmen who have the traditional skills.

From the start of his new career as a historian, Liang was determined to search and discover what he termed the Grammar of Chinese architecture.

Following the Mukden Incident in 1931, Imperial Japan began establishing strangleholds throughout China's north, ultimately culminating into Second Sino-Japanese War, which forced Liang Sicheng and Lin Huiyin to cut short their cultural restoration work in Beijing, and flee southward along with faculty and materials of the Architectural Department of Northeastern University.

Liang and Lin along with their children and their university continued their studies and research work in temporary settlements in the cities of Tianjin, Kunming, and finally in Lizhuang.

[4] Liang, whose brother-in-law Lin Heng served as a fighter pilot in the Chinese air force and died in the air war against Japan, recommended that the Americans military authorities spare the ancient Japanese cities of Kyoto and Nara: After the war, Liang was invited to establish the architectural and urban planning programs at Tsinghua University.

In 1946, he went to Yale University as a visiting fellow and served as the Chinese representative in the design of the United Nations Headquarters Building.

To spread and share his understandings and appreciation of Chinese architecture, and most importantly, to help save its diminishing building technologies, Liang published his first book, Qing Structural Regulations in 1934.

Liang considered the study of Qing Structural Regulation as a stepping stone to the much more daunting task of studying the Song dynasty Yingzao Fashi (Treatise on Architectural Methods), due to the large number of specialist terms used in that manual differing substantially from the Qing dynasty architectural terminology.

Liang considered the Yingzao Fashi and Qing Structural Regulations as "two grammar books of Chinese architecture."

All of these books became the platform for later scholars to explore the principles and evolution of Chinese architecture, and are still considered classics today.

Liang's advice that it should resemble the stone memorial stele universally found throughout China swayed the design group.

They listed their arguments in the "Suggestions on the location of central government district", which could also be seen in the letter Liang wrote to the Prime Minister of China Zhou Enlai at that time.

After months of deliberations, the proposal was rejected; party leaders including Mao and Liu Shaoqi weighed in and confirmed that the administrative center would be located in the Inner City.

He was persecuted again during the Cultural Revolution as "an authority of counter-revolutionary scholarship"; his university colleagues were sent to rural regions as part of the "Down to the Countryside Movement".

Liang and Lin Zhu hid his documents, including Annotated Yingzao Fashi, to avoid possible confiscation or destruction by the Red Guards.