The Japanese style garden abhors decor because it’s based entirely on nature. There is one exception that changed everything: the tea ceremony. The ritualized drink is the root of the tea garden, which is laid out for the experience of visitors to the tea house. They typically enter the front gate and walk up landscaped pathways to the tea house within the garden. On the way there will be a water bowl for washing prior to imbibing. There is also lighting to guide visitors after dark to the destination. Every view, every nuance is considered by the garden master.
This gives us the Japanese root of Asian style in any landscape, whether it’s wholly dedicated or just suggestive of Eastern sensibilities. They are exceptionally fine gardens for shaded home sites and work nicely within smaller urban spaces. Just a few signature plants and two items will brand your garden Eastern, if you know what they are.
The water bowl became the first real manmade ornament in these gardens. Originally it was made of carved granite, but now concrete makes a more affordable alternative. The washing bowl usually sits in a field of pebbles that cover a little depression where splash can drain away without puddling. It’s not uncommon to find a flowing bamboo spout associated with water bowls rendering them a recirculating water feature as well. The third value of the water bowl is as a water source luring birds and bees in the heat.
The need to illuminate the path to the tea house resulted in the pagoda lights or towers, each used in a different way. In modern gardens it can become a focal point day and night, close or far in the view. The short squat designs we see are mass produced after the snow-viewing lanterns with their wide caps that catch the snow buildup for special effects on winter nights. Stone towers were originally temple ornaments repurposed in private gardens. Originally these were lit by shallow bowls of oil with floating wicks. Now they can be easily lighted with low voltage landscape fixtures.
When locating these elements in your garden, create a setting for each. Add boulders or just use dense mounding plants to give them a context. The water bowl should be created on the pebble field, often Mexican black beach pebbles.
Recycled irregular paving stones are another element of old Japanese gardens. In the past these were so valuable they were pieced together like a mosaic with other kinds of similar colored stones to create mixed unit paving. The use of natural flagstone slabs is the other walking surface.
Two plants define the tea garden and represent the transitional seasons of spring and fall. Flowering cherry trees are the symbol of spring in Japan. Vivid Japanese maples in full autumn color identify the coming of winter. These are often the biggest source of color in the mostly green garden, but neither abide heat and drought. Consider adding both characters with one native Western redbud, Cercis occidentalis, with its early spring bloom and sunset fall foliage.
Give some thought to your ground plane planting. While azaleas have always been primary here, climate change and drought may preclude them in some areas. Among the easiest plants to start with are Pinus mugo mughus, the mugo pine, which stays small and adapts nicely to poodling or left natural. Nandina domestica, aka heavenly bamboo, is another vivid foliage plant. Siberian iris and other easy German iris types can work nicely in lieu of water iris in drier regions.
The Japanese tea garden is a beautiful tradition that makes sense out of an Asian inspired landscape. But in Japan, the gardens are more than that. They are symbolic of life, and through them humans discover themselves. Let’s borrow that age old tranquility with the plants and elements rooted in spirituality, architecture and a deep reverence for nature.
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Maureen Gilmer is an author, horticulturist and landscape designer. Learn more at www.MoPlants.com
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