Traditional Houses of Four Regions: Northern Delta Three-Bay House, Hue Rường House, Central Highlands Rông House, Northwest Stilt House

Why do the four regions have different styles of housing?

These four traditional house styles grew out of different natural conditions, social organisations and beliefs. The three-bay house of the Northern Delta and the rường house of Huế belong to the plains, where people build on solid ground, use wood as the main material and organise space around the patrilineal family. The rông house of the Central Highlands and the stilt house of the Northwest belong to the hills and mountains, where people build tall stilt houses to avoid damp and wild animals, and where the house is tied to the communal life of the buôn làng (village) or bản mường (mường settlement).

The section on the three-bay house of the Northern Delta is based on an article by Vũ Trường Giang (2026) in Tạp chí Xây dựng; the other three styles are based on four articles in Nhân Dân newspaper. Where the sources differ, the article will say so clearly.

What the four house styles have in common

All four styles use natural materials available on the spot: wood, bamboo, nứa bamboo, thatch grass or cỏ tranh grass. A load-bearing wooden frame of columns and beams is common to all four, even though the names of the parts and the way they are assembled differ. Each house style has an area set aside for worship or spiritual activity, and the position of that area reflects ideas about hierarchy within the family or the community.

The fundamental difference lies in who the house is for. The three-bay house of the Northern Delta and the rường house of Huế are houses for one family, while the rông house of the Central Highlands is the house of an entire village. The stilt house of the Northwest is both the family's dwelling and a space carrying conventions about the roles of men and women.

The three-bay house of the Northern Delta

According to Vũ Trường Giang (2026), the traditional house of the Kinh people is commonly the three-bay house with two side wings, organised along a horizontal axis and extended lengthwise. The central bay is the spiritual and public heart of the house, where worship and the receiving of guests take place; the side bays and wings are used for daily living, rest or storage. The load-bearing wooden frame consists of columns, beams and trusses, joined with mortise and tenon and set on stone footings to resist damp. The roof is covered with fired clay tiles at a steep pitch for fast drainage, extending forward into a veranda that catches the wind and blocks the sun.

Also according to this article, Kinh villages in the plains are clustered together with dense building, and the house gives priority to a façade looking out onto the courtyard.

The rường house of Huế

According to researcher Nguyễn Đắc Xuân, the rường house of Huế originates from Quảng Trị. When Lord Nguyễn Hoàng moved into Huế around the 17th century, he brought rường houses with him, and by this account many rường houses in Huế were later bought in Quảng Trị and brought back to be reassembled. The name "rường" comes from the house having many rường columns, rường trusses and mè, with an architectural layout in the shape of the characters Đinh, Khẩu or Công.

The number of bays in a rường house is defined by rows of columns. The two wings at either end of the house are separated from the central bays by partitions. The usable space is usually divided into four parts: the central bay is for receiving guests at the front and for worshipping deities, Buddhas and ancestors at the back; the eastern chamber belongs to the male head of the household; the western chamber belongs to his mother or wife, who is female; the rear section running continuously from east to west is called the hậu liêu, used as bedrooms for the children or as storage.

According to the article in Nhân Dân newspaper, the rường house of Huế shows Chinese architectural influence in its feng shui elements and in the intricate carving on columns, đòn giông, altars, couplets, horizontal panels and decorative details. But a rường house is not merely a wooden house: it is bound up with its garden. The whole garden house is laid out according to the principles of feng shui: the house has a screen wall in front on the main axis of the central bay, two symbols of dragon and crouching tiger face each other on either side of the courtyard, and the minh đường is a water element that may be a dry pool in the courtyard or a lotus pond behind a miniature rockery.

The article also quotes cultural researcher Chu Sơn: "Kings and lords lived in rường houses. Royal relatives lived in rường houses. Mandarins lived in rường houses. The rich lived in rường houses. Buddhas and Saints lived in rường houses. Ghosts and demons also lived in rường houses. Ancestors lived in rường houses. Descendants also lived in rường houses". This way of speaking shows that the rường house is tied to many social classes and many different activities in Huế culture.

One point to note: the article reports that rường houses are also found in many central provinces from Quảng Bình and Quảng Trị to Quảng Nam and Quảng Ngãi, and even in the Southwest, but when people speak of rường houses they usually think immediately of Huế.

The rông house of the Central Highlands

According to the article in Nhân Dân newspaper, in the Central Highlands each ethnic group builds its rông house differently, even though at a glance they look alike. The rông house of the Giẻ Triêng is small and low, that of the Xê Đăng soars high, that of the Gia Rai is slender like an axe blade planted upside down into the blue sky, while that of the Ba Na is soft like a mother hen standing in the middle with her chicks, the surrounding stilt houses, around her.

The article notes a fact: at the time of writing, the rông house survives only among the ethnic groups of the northern Central Highlands, from Gia Lai outward to the groups along the Trường Sơn range in Quảng Trị, Thừa Thiên Huế and Quảng Nam. In the southern Central Highlands, from Đắk Lắk inward, among groups such as the Ê Đê and Mơ Nông, the rông house no longer exists and people build long houses instead, and the communal meaning of the long house is not the same as that of the rông house.

To build a rông house, usually only a few people in each village or in the whole area have both the talent and the transmitted craft, and are capable of directing the villagers in the building. The house uses only thatch, bamboo, nứa and leaves, and only axes and machetes, yet it can withstand the dry-season highland winds and the rains of the wet season.

The rông house is both the place where villagers gather, likened by the article to the "heart" of the village, and a response to essential needs: a place to sleep, a hearth, a place for guests. A guest arriving in the village is invited up into the rông house and treated as if at home; at mealtimes the villagers bring food and the guest becomes everyone's guest. The rông house also has a place for villagers to meet, a wide floor for sitting and a spaced floor for sitting and drinking rượu cần. In some villages people build two rông houses: the female rông house for women and the male rông house for men.

Spiritually, according to the article, the rông house carries great meaning and governs the mental life of the village. The article compares it in one respect to the đình làng (communal house) of the Vietnamese. The house expresses the strength of the village: the bigger the rông house, the stronger and more prosperous the village. The rông house is regarded as a sacred place, an intermediary between people and the Yang, so all the spiritual activities of the villagers take place there. Every rông house must have a place for sacred objects, and the roof of every rông house is decorated with patterns and motifs imitating the sun and the fern.

As a rule, the rông house always stands at the centre of the village. The article cites the view of architects: with only their hands and their estimating eyes, with only knives and axes, the people of the Central Highlands created the rông house with proportions judged to be harmonious. The floor of a traditional rông house is laid with le, with gaps left so that when rice wine is drunk from the jar, any liquid that spills runs straight through the floor. The rông house belongs to the whole village but also to each individual: unmarried young men and widowers may come up to sleep there each night.

The article also sets out the differences between the traditional rông house and the cultural rông house built with state investment. According to the article, the cultural rông house is usually placed beside the commune office rather than at the centre of the village, has no place for sacred objects, uses a concrete or tightly fitted wooden floor instead of a spaced le floor, and is usually locked at night. The article puts forward the view that these are the reasons why some cultural rông houses are little used by the community.

The stilt house of the Northwest

According to an article by Trần Văn Hạc in Nhân Dân newspaper, the stilt house of the ancient Thái people of the Northwest is described as a house of "three worlds", made up of the three elements of heaven, earth and humanity. The bản mường of the Thái in the Northwest usually cluster beside streams and at the foot of hills, following the principle of "sơn chầu thủy tụ" (mountains gathering, waters converging).

As for the heavenly element, the ancient Thái of the Northwest conceive of a three-tiered universe that is interconnected and in communion. The stilt house usually has two gable ends curving gently like a turtle shell, called "tụp cống", linked to the legend of the turtle deity "pua tấu" who taught the Thái how to build houses. On the ridge pole at the two gable ends, two wooden bars are fixed crossing each other in an X shape, called khau cút. Depending on the family's circumstances and social status, the khau cút is decorated differently, from simple to complex, bearing patterns and motifs of a crescent moon, lotus flowers and the buds of the guột plant, and always with a male flower and a female flower symbolising yin and yang and the longing for growth.

Inside the stilt house there is always a sacred column, the "sau hẹ". On the sacred column hangs a bamboo basket symbolising the sky, called chóp nguôm, on which are hung a wooden image of the turtle deity, three ears of rice, three sprigs of dill, a packet of mustard seeds, wooden carvings of a male and a female spirit figure, and a sword. The sacred column is described by the article as a bridge between earth and sky. On the ends of the trusses and the window sills are many geometric designs and motifs imitating grasses, trees, flowers, leaves and birds and animals, in symmetrical pairs following the principle of harmonious yin and yang, among them a carving of two thuồng luồng (serpents) facing each other.

In the stilt house of the ancient Thái of the Northwest there are two hearths, one reserved for men and one for women. As for the earthly element, the house is made of good wood, bamboo and hóp, roofed with thatch, and usually rests its back against the hills and mountains while facing the river, stream or fields, following the criterion of "sơn chầu thủy tụ". When building, feng shui is emphasised in order to overcome the shortcomings of the land and the age of the household head. The Thái have a saying: "Làm ăn có tháng, làm nhà có ngày" (there are months for farming, days for building a house).

As for the human element, the structure of the stilt house expresses the role and position of each member of the family. The house always has two staircases: "tang chan" and "tang quản". The staircase on the chan side is for women, usually with nine steps corresponding to the "nine souls". The staircase on the quản side is for men, usually with seven steps corresponding to the "seven souls". In the stilt house, from the hearth on the quản side all the way to the end of the tang quản is the area for men and for worship. The bản mường structure of the Thái in the Northwest is organised in concentric circles: family, bản, small mường, large mường.

The article also notes that today, along with social development, many modern materials are used in building, but the most fundamental elements of traditional culture are still respected.

Comparison table of four traditional house types

Why is the difference so great?

The cited sources explain the differences in several directions. For the Central Highlands communal house, the article in Nhân Dân emphasizes the community role of the house: the communal house is a place for common activities, for receiving guests, for spiritual activities, and the form of the house expresses the strength of the village. For the Northwest stilt house, the article by Trần Văn Hạc explains the difference through the three-tiered cosmological concept and the division of male and female roles in the space of the house. For the Huế rường house, the article cites the explanation of researcher Nguyễn Đắc Xuân about its origin from Quảng Trị and the influence of Chinese architecture in feng shui and carving elements.

A point to note is that these sources do not offer a single common explanation for all four cases, but each source focuses on one case. For the Northern three-bay house, Vũ Trường Giang links the form of the house to lowland village planning: the village is concentrated and inward-looking, so the house develops along a horizontal axis, the facade looks out to the yard and has a discreet enclosing wall.

Do all places in the same region build houses the same way?

No. Even within the Central Highlands, the article reports that each ethnic group has a different way of building its communal house. The communal house of the Giẻ Triêng is small and low, that of the Xê Đăng soars high, that of the Gia Rai is graceful, that of the Ba Na is soft. In the southern Central Highlands, ethnic groups such as the Ê Đê and Mơ Nông do not build communal houses but long houses; according to the article on the Ê Đê long house, the long house is where the extended family lives together under a matrilineal system, is regularly extended each time a female member of the extended family marries, and usually has from seven to nine married couples living together.

As for the rường house, the article also reports that this type of house exists in many central provinces and even the Southwest, but when people speak of rường houses they usually think of Huế. This shows that one house type can appear in many localities with different variants, with no single model for the whole region.

How have traditional houses changed today?

All the sources note change. The article on the Northwest stilt house reports that many modern materials have been introduced into construction, but the basic elements of traditional culture are still respected. The article on the Ê Đê long house quotes village elder Ama Jeny of Akŏ Dhŏng village as saying that the shape of the long house today has changed quite a lot in width, length, staircase and interior arrangement compared with before. The article on the communal house notes the appearance of cultural communal houses invested in by the State, alongside the village's traditional communal house.

These changes take place in different directions in each region, and the sources do not offer an overall judgment on whether such changes are better or worse.

What should be kept in mind when learning about traditional houses?

The first thing is not to treat any one house type as the model by which to measure other house types. Each house type formed in its own context and meets its own needs. The second thing is that within the same region, ethnic groups and localities may have different variants, so the scope that the source records should be clearly stated. The third thing is that sources may not agree with one another on some details, for example on the origin or the time of formation of a house type; in that case, the different explanations should all be presented rather than choosing one and treating it as the only one.

This article is based on four articles in Nhân Dân newspaper on the Huế rường house, the Central Highlands communal house, the stilt house of the Northwest Thái people and the Ê Đê long house, together with an article by Vũ Trường Giang (2026) in Tạp chí Xây dựng on the three-bay house of the Kinh people.