Hostas are hardy and reliable perennial plants native to Japan. Wild species and garden cultivars provide lush foliage – and an amazing variety of leaf shapes, sizes, textures & colors.
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It may surprise you to learn that the stone bridge in the entryway of the Seattle Japanese Garden was not a part of the 1960 construction of the garden. In fact, the stone bridge was already part of the landscape when the first plans for the garden were drafted in 1959.
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Nandina domestica, usually called “heavenly bamboo” or “sacred bamboo,” is a fine-textured evergreen shrub, not a true bamboo. In Japan, it’s associated with good fortune, and often planted near residential doorways.
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Japanese maples are truly a four-season plant… And, perhaps most notable, the brilliant display of fall. The beauty of each season is in its impermanence, the daily change and inevitable shift into the next phase.
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In Japanese-style gardens, foreground shrubs are often pruned into the semi-spherical shape known as tamamono. Repeated, this simple form contributes mass and stability to the garden, and a sense of peacefulness & tranquility as we encounter it
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This evolving “culture of wood” was very different from that of the West. In Japan, wood’s susceptibility to fire, moisture and extremes of weather was embraced – as was the notion of transience (setsuna).
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When working on these wild plants, we are not trying to shape them. We are allowing them to grow “where they will” and simply making adjustments and clarifications.
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When Juki Iida considered the challenge of building a garden overseas, he described the American counterparts he anticipated working with as “gardeners”. An article published in the Journal of the Japanese Institute of Landscape Architects solves the challenge of translating this term, and reveals what Iida likely thought of the team he would assemble to build the Japanese garden in Seattle.
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