Japanese Garden Design: some ideas
Would you like to make a twist to your garden and you feel like having a Japanese garden style? You can incorporate some of the principles of the Japanese garden and giving your own individual twist at the same time. You can create a space for yourself with an Asian touch.
Gardening styles are beginning to spread in the landscape of gardening and one of them is the so called “Japanese Garden”. This kind of style has some aesthetic principles like “shizen” (natural) or “kanso” (austerity) and they are part of Japanese culture characterised by their respect in history and tradition.
Japanese garden style in your garden is a way of evading reality and it encourages inner meditation. All elements in the garden must be prepare in a particular way and must follow a balance. The most important features in a Japanese garden are:
1. Unstable equilibrium: this is one of the basic guidelines when setting a garden of this style and it is written in the Japanese text of the twelfth century “ ’Sakutei-Ki”. All gardens must turn around the unstable equilibrium among Man, Heaven and Earth. If we think now of the Japanese garden, we can see that the apparent disorder they have makes sense. It finds beauty in the imperfection. The combinations in the garden when you walk in the narrow zigzag paths are “unstable” but it has the “equilibrium”since every element marks a reversal.
2. Stones: in the Japanese garden they symbolise mountains or islands surrounded by an imaginary sea. We can put sand around the stones and create imaginary waves with them.
3. The importance of water. It should appear as naturally occurring. You can place artificial waterfalls, koi ponds or flowing streams. You should not miss a small pond inhabited by fishes and water lillies living in perfect harmony with a small wooden bridge over it.
Also remember to include some Asian culture feature, like a lantern, a shoji lamp or even a sculpture of the Buddha.
All these ideas can be useful but you need a good knowledge of Oriental philosophy and his concept of man in order to achieve the ideal space for meditation. You can find more information by reading some books on Japanese gardening and have some ideas with the online UK store on Japanese gardens.
Comments (2)