Japanese gardens (日本庭園, nihon teien) are traditional gardens whose designs are accompanied by Japanese aesthetics and philosophical ideas.Japanese Friendship Garden, Phoenix, Arizona
These spaces of meditation and reflection avoid artificial ornamentation, and highlight the natural landscape.St. Mungo Museum of Art, Glasgow, Scotland
Plants and worn, aged materials are often used by Japanese garden designers to suggest a natural landscape, and to express the fragility of existence as well as time’s unstoppable advance.Kōraku-en, Okayama, Japan
Water is an important feature of many gardens, as are rocks and often gravel.Jissoin Temple, Kyoto, Japan
Despite there being many attractive Japanese flowering plants, herbaceous flowers generally play much less of a role in Japanese gardens than in the West.Shofuso Japanese House and Garden, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Exceptions include seasonally flowering shrubs and treees, made all the more dramatic because of the contrast with the usual predominant green.Kairaku-en, Mito, Japan
Japanese gardens often capture aspects of the traditional Shinto religion, as well as Daoism and Buddhism.Kokedera – Moss Temple, Kyoto, Japan
The gardens speak of the unstoppable march of time, natural aspects of the Japanese landscape.Adachi Museum of Art, Yasugi, Japan
Wherever you find a Japanese Garden, take time to connect with time, space, and your own heart.Taizo-in Garden, Myoshin-ji Temple Complex, Kyoto, Japan
Japanese Garden, Fort Worth, Texas