Impression West Lake is one of Chinese top live-action performances strongly featured by the local culture and unique charm of Hangzhou West Lake. It is nationwide famous for its dreamlike show and fantastic elegance. Actually, the visitors in Hangzhou are unexceptionally eager to watch this life-size performance, because it is one mingled and charming show of Hangzhou culture and history. Impression West Lake is one of the representatives created by Zhang Yimou who is Chinese most famous movie director and the general director of the opening ceremony of Beijing 2008 Olympic Games, Wang Chaoge and Fan Yue. Impression West Lake is the third performance (the first and the second live-action performance made by them are Impression Liu Sanjie and Impression Lijiang River) shown initially in 2007.

    The history and culture of West Lake as well as the beautiful natural landscape of West Lake are the origin of Impression West Lake. This performance vividly shows the folklores and myths of Hangzhou and highlights the best of them. Via the high technology, the makers recreate The Rain of West Lake, which in some ways reflects the natural charm of rain of West Lake and West Lake in rain. The whole scenes of performance are live-action show with the real water and hills as the performance background. By virtue of the life-like and life-size show, the rooted culture and the natural beauty of Hangzhou are highly exhibited. Kitaro Matsuri, a world-class musician, created the aesthetic background music for this performance. Zhang Liangyin, a Chinese popular singer sings the themed song, and her heaven-like sound brings the audiences into the environment of dream and romantic Hangzhou.

    Venue of Impression West Lake Performance is Yuehu Lake Scenic Area. It is from Lord Zhao Causeway of South to Yuehu Lake Tower of North and from Quyuan Fenghe of West to Lord Su Causeway of East. At the south of Yuehu Lake Tower, there is a retractable and moveable elevation-type stand. This stand can hold 1800 audiences. The whole performance equipments are environmentally friendly. The facilities are the internationally advanced, so is the technology they use. The actors' performance is shown on the water of West Lake. It is not opera, dream or party but thousands of years show.