Woman transforms barren mountainside into 1,500m² garden after early retirement

At age 42, a woman named Shirley decided to retire early and leave her life in Shanghai to return to her hometown in Xiapu County, Fujian Province, China. After years of focusing on her career in fashion design and raising a family, a serious illness in 2021 prompted her to reconsider her lifestyle and desire to live closer to her aging parents.

Shirley invested over 3 million yuan (approximately 10 billion VND) to transform a barren mountainside into a 1,500m² six-tier terraced garden. Over a period of 1.5 years, she cultivated nearly 1,000 types of plants, fulfilling a childhood dream of living surrounded by nature and the sea.