Shenyang is where the Manchus built a capital before they took Beijing, where two Qing founders lie beneath green-tiled tumuli, and where a staged railway bombing in 1931 opened Asia's road to world war. Three days covers all of it.
Built from 1625 by Nurhaci and completed by Huang Taiji, this 60,000 sq m palace of 114 buildings is the only surviving Chinese imperial palace besides Beijing's. The octagonal Dazheng Hall and the Ten Princes' Pavilions show Manchu tent-camp layout in brick.
Founded in 1829 by Bian Fu, Laobian claims to be China's oldest dumpling house — the broth-braised filling technique dates to the Daoguang reign. Steamed baskets of pork-and-leek and the house three-flavour dumplings anchor the menu on pedestrian Zhongjie.
The 1629 mausoleum of Nurhaci, founder of the Later Jin state and grandfather of the Qing conquest, sits on a wooded hillside above the Hun River. A 108-step stone staircase climbs to the Soul Tower and the earth mound where he and Empress Xiaocigao lie.
Founded in 1636 in the Chongde reign and rebuilt in 1662, this Hui Muslim mosque keeps a Chinese courtyard plan with an upturned-eave prayer hall rather than domes. Stone tablets in the front court record Qing-era imperial grants to the community.
Built at the Liutiaohu rail spur where Japanese officers blew up their own track on 18 September 1931 to justify seizing Manchuria, the museum's calendar-page monument is frozen on that date. Fifteen years of occupation are documented inside.
The former Sujiatun locomotive depot holds around 20 engines, including Japanese-built Manchurian Railway (Mantetsu) locomotives and the SL Pacific class that hauled colonial-era expresses. The roundhouse and turntable survive intact.
The 1914-1933 compound of warlord Zhang Zuolin and his son Zhang Xueliang mixes a Chinese siheyuan with the green Da Qing Lou, a Roman-style villa. Zhang Xueliang planned the 1936 Xi'an Incident that forced Chiang Kai-shek into an anti-Japanese alliance.
Laid out by the Japanese in 1913 as Naniwa Square, this circular plaza is ringed by colonial banks and the Yamato Hotel. At its centre stands a 1970 Mao statue, 10.5 m tall on a plinth of 58 Cultural Revolution figures — among China's largest surviving.
Huang Taiji, who renamed the dynasty Qing in 1636 and died a year before it took Beijing, lies here with Empress Xiaoduanwen. Built 1643-1651, the spirit way is lined with stone camels, horses and elephants leading to a walled Square City and burial mound.
Grown around the 1645 White Pagoda temple, Xita has been a Korean quarter since Joseon migrants arrived under Japanese rule. Charcoal barbecue houses, dog-soup restaurants and Korean bakeries fill the blocks around Shiyiwei Road.
China's first public museum, opened 1949 in the former Manchukuo bank building, holds Hongshan culture jades from 5000 BC, Liao dynasty gold and one of the country's best calligraphy and painting collections, including Tang and Song scrolls.
The Tiexi district was Mao-era China's industrial heartland, built on Japanese factory foundations. This 1937 Shenyang Heavy Machinery workshop now holds a bookshop, theatre and bars under its original crane gantries and riveted steel roof.