Another reason for the sterile feeling, apart from the lack of trees, is the lack of things generally. For such an enormous place, there are relatively few rooms, and in fact I'm pretty sure you never go inside any room in the whole complex. Most of the rooms are large, ceremonial rooms in the center of each of these massive barriers, with sappy names like the Hall of Eternal Harmony, the Hall of Perpetual Harmony, and the Hall of Harmonious Union... you get the idea. As the emperors degenerated into opium addicts in the nineteenth century, much of the treasure housed at the palace was stolen by the palace eunuchs. When the last emperor was thrown out of the palace in 1924, the remaining treasure was displayed here in a museum, but again much of that was lost to the Japanese during World War 2, and much ended up being taken by the departing Chinese army fleeing to Taiwan, where it still resides. So what little is left is totally insufficient to fill all this space.