Perfectly contained wilderness - Japanese irises in the Imperial Palace East Garden in Tokyo

Rolling fields of Japanese irises in full bloom - a lovely illusion of wilderness and a perfect contrast to the "formal" parts of the Imperial Palace East Garden.

 

Despite having walked around the Imperial Palace grounds on my previous trips to Tokyo, this was the first time that I actually entered the East Garden. I'm not quite sure why - but better late than never, I guess.

This 52 acre park is surrounded by deep moats, dramatic stone walls, and reached through several stone bridges and gates. It was built on grounds that belonged to the Edo Castle, the seat of the Tokugawa Shoguns that ruled Japan from 1603 to 1868. After that, the Meiji Restoration re-established the Imperial family's power, Edo was named Tokyo, and the Imperial family moved here from Kyoto. The palace has been rebuilt at least twice, first after a great fire in the late 19th century, and then due to destruction during the World War II. The East Garden forms its own area on the side of the actual palace complex, and is the only part of the Tokyo Imperial Palace grounds that is open to public.

 

 Seimon Ishibashi bridge leads to the main entrance to the palace (the entrance to the gardens available to public is on the east side of the palace grounds).

The huge moat remains from the Edo period, together with several beautiful guard towers.
 

 The monumental stone walls are so beautiful - I love the arched (do you call them that...?) corners, they are so typically Japanese in form.

 

The adjective most often used to describe these gardens seems to be "manicured" - with a hint of... I'm not quite sure what, arrogance maybe, or some kind of imagined superiority. I'm not sure why. I mean, what would you expect from a garden just outside the palace and residence of Emperor Akihito, the 125th emperor of his line? Not an avant garde patch with experimental plantings, but a garden that transmits the permanence and continuity of the imperial office and the Japanese culture through their traditional garden design - definitely not one that is just "accidentally there".

 

The wilder parts of the gardens, closer to the outer edge, with meadows filled with Japanese irises under cherries, most of which had already finished flowering.

 Iris japonica, such a perfect plant for the Emperor's gardens.

The irises and cherries were nearly done with their blooming; kerrias, azaleas and wisterias were just beginning theirs.

A little stream under Japanese maples just furling out their leaves, together with grasses and variegated bamboos...

 One more picture of the Japanese irises... I loved the wild and free feeling of some parts of the gardens.

 

Anyway. The walls and moats form a strong, impressive frame to the garden as you enter the garden  - they can't be seen from inside, but the impression stays in your mind. In the actual garden, paths linger around beds of bearded irises form like rivers through the garden; hedges of azaleas and rhododendrons are closely trimmed into sculptural forms; behind ponds, they disappear into a wilderness of rolling fields filled with Japanese irises. The whole effect is based on the contrast of the contained and the wild. All carefully planned, executed and maintained, of course - but then, what else would you expect of a garden of this rank?

 

Only very few cherries were still in flower here, but the buds of the wisteria (see pergola in the middle of the picture) were swelling, and will be gorgeous just in a couple of weeks.

 

 

A tiny waterfall run down into from the wilder parts of the garden into the pond below.

Yet another angle on the pergola - several artistically pruned pines were part of the gardens.

 

The lovely Suwa no chaya tea house, also from the Edo period, is part of the gardens - unfortunately (and understandably...), no tea was served here to the strolling visitors.  

Peony gazing in Ueno Park in Tokyo

Entrance to the peony garden in Ueno Park in Tokyo.

Last week was our spring break and we spent it in Tokyo, almost exactly two years since our previous trip there. This year's spring had been warm, so all things green had developed a bit further than then. Still, we managed to catch loads of sakura trees in full bloom and even sit under then, with falling petals swirling down like snowflakes around us.

Paper parasols are used to protect the flowers from too much sun - such a typically Japanese, beautiful way to do things...

 Old ladies taking a rest in the shade.

More about the cherries later; another glorious favorite of the Japanese, the tree peony, was also just coming to full bloom in the gardens. While strolling around Ueno Park, the oldest of Tokyo's many public gardens, we popped into an area specifically dedicated to these sumptuous bloomers. It felt like we were transported back in time; the wooden signs showing the names, and the bamboo shelters and paper parasols protecting the flowers were just like in some old pictures I'd seen, depicting "peony gazing" in Japan during long gone eras.

A hand-colored 19th century photo of ladies gazing peonies in Tokyo - maybe even in the Ueno Park?
Tree peonies are thought to have arrived to Japan from China already in the 8th century, but their cultivation became widely popular first in the Edo Period (1603 to 1868). Due to this long history, they are often depicted in visual arts and poetry, representing good fortune as well as a righteous and noble spirit.

Nothing seems to have changed in the arrangement of the flowers during the last hundred years...

Mainly older Japanese ladies and gentlemen were admiring the huge peony blooms, frequently stopping to discuss their specifics along their route around the rised flower beds. Many of them took countless pictures of the flowers, with huge lenses for recording their minute details. It felt just like they'd never seen such beauties before, even if their ages clearly showed that it couldn't be the case. This was all about the peonies and nothing else; very few other plants were allowed to mingle and distract from the stars of the show.

My favorite old uncle - first, he examined the flowers carefully, then took what seemed like thousands of photos of them with his special lens...

A couple of weeks, and the fleeting glory of the peonies is over; just like the sakura, maybe the favorite flower of the Japanese, they are such a great reminder of how nothing is everlasting.

Hama-Rikyu gardens - a breathing space in central Tokyo

The huge flower field of Hama-rikyu provides a shimmering escape from the busy city life, with rape flowers in full bloom in spring and cosmos in late summer. Shiodome's skyscrapers loom in the background, reminding of the reality...

 

In Tokyo, an early morning visit to the Tsukiji fish market - world's largest such - is kind of a must, especially if you love seafood (so much that tourists are seen as pests by the fishmongers...). The bustle and commerce can be a bit overwhelming, but the variety of the edible harvest from the seas is truly amazing to view; from huge tunas to meat-filled seashells and leathery seaweed varieties to tiniest little fish, you will guaranteed see things you never thought were edible (or even existed). Eating the freshest possible sushi in one of the little restaurants in the market area crowns the morning - it will be the measuring stick to all the sushi you will eat afterwards. Unless you really are hard core about fish, there's no need to be there for the 5 AM tuna auction; plenty remains to see even at 7 or 8 am. After 9, the activity cools significantly down, and buyers start to transport their catch to the restaurants all over Tokyo and Japan.

 

Huge stone walls surround the garden; it was built on land reclaimed from the sea, and features a huge tidal pond inside the walls.

Cherries in full bloom, and one of the arched bridges leading over the many ponds. If you look closely, you can detect a team of gardeners in work, cloud pruning the old pines.

View from Fujimi hill, the highest point in the gardens, towards Nakajima-no-ochaya, the floating tea room in the middle of one of the ponds.

 

After all the business of Tsukiji, the Hama-Rikyu gardens just a short stroll away is a great place to restore your senses. This large, open garden from mid 17th century was originally the duck-hunting grounds and summer residence of the Tokugawa shogunate, that is, the Tokugawa clan of military leaders called the shoguns, who run Japan from 1660 until the Meiji restoration reinstalled the Emperor to his throne in 1868. After this, the imperial family used the gardens as their beach residence.

 

 Another view of the huge flower field...

 

 O-tsutai-bashi, a 118 meter long bridge leading to the floating tearoom.

 

Nakajima-no-ochaya tea room, a popular spot for older Japanese to enjoy their tea...

Probably not what the Shoguns would have appreciated, but a well-needed break for my girls from the busy city...

 

Much of the gardens were built on reclaimed land, and they feature typical Japanese high stone walls and a large tidal water pond, which is regulated by several floodgates. The buildings on the site were badly damaged in the Great Kanto earth quake in 1923, and later again in the Second World War. The gardens and a couple of tea houses were restored after the war, and the park was donated to the city of Tokyo by the imperial family. There is really not much to see from the botanical point of view, but the Hama-Rikyu is worth visiting as a great example of a typical daimyo - which means a Japanese feudal lord, as the Tokugawas were - garden from the Edo period. And as a breathing space between all business of Tokyo, it is just priceless.

This is me, in 30+ years time... An old Japanese lady, who photographed what looked like every single cherry tree on in the large gardens. 

Contemplating the void at a quiet Ryoan-ji

The karesansui at Ryoan-ji originates from the 15th century, and forms a small part of the gardens surrounding the Zen Buddhist Temple. There are many theories of who built it, with highly respected Zen monk Tokuho Zenketsu most often mentioned as the original creator. The fifteen stones are placed in small groups, and when looking from any given angle, only fourteen of them are visible at one time; it is said that the fifteenth can only be seen by those who have attained enlightenment. A pink weeping cherry outside the wall completes the composition.

 

I admit that I had to drag my 10 and 12 year old daughters to this garden, telling them that they would regret forever if they'd been in Kyoto and not seen the karesansui of Ryoan-ji, one of the most famous, abstract masterpieces of Japanese garden design. Not entirely convinced about the value of some well-placed stones set in a carefully raked sea of gravel , they nevertheless agreed to follow for a morning visit.

 

Luckily, not many tourists had found their way to the garden when we visited. Sitting on the on the viewing veranda called the hōjō, we had long discussions about the possible interpretations of the enigmatic garden. Both girls found the high walls fascinating, built as they are of clay boiled in oil that now has seeped through forming cloud-like patterns on the surface. And probably not as elegant and Zen as the garden, our interpretations of its possible meanings were quite poetic - my girls' favorite being 'tiger cubs crossing water with their mother', followed by 'little islands floating in a misty sea'. We talked also about the gravel as the important void in the composition; working like a pause in a piece of music or like empty space in an ink painting, it could be inspired by the concept of emptiness, a central idea in Zen Buddhism.

 

What surprises me (and makes me amazingly happy) is that Ryoan-ji proved to be one of the absolute favorites of my girls of all places we visited while in Japan. Instead of visiting 'just another garden' (I might have dragged them to one too many by now...), we felt that we really connected, both with each other, and with the place. Which might prove that less is more even when it comes to garden design - it just has to be the right kind of 'less'.

 

A stone path under an arbor of weeping cherries leads to Kuri, the main building of the monastery. the bamboo frames protect plants from deer. At right, a gardener in work in her huge bonnet.

 

More impressive stonework - here well-assembled steps leading to Kuri, the main building, which also works as the residence of the abbot of the monastery adjoining the temple.

 

In a hallway and in front of a beautiful courtyard, a small stone model has an explanation of the rock garden before you enter the actual viewing platform.

 

Here they are, my family sitting on the viewing veranda called the hōjō, discussing the possible meanings of the stones and the composition...

 

Beautiful, delicate ink paintings fill the walls at the Kuri. The viewing veranda is to the left from these rooms.

 

Behind the clay wall, on the way to the surrounding large garden... the wall is just as beautiful from behind. And note the large support for the old tree - so typical for Japanese gardening, showing respect for all things (and beings) old.

 

A 'behind the scenes' photo of the cherry so important for the composition (see the first picture)... here you can see all the many supports keeping it from loosing its limbs.

 

The Kyoyochi Pond was made already in the 12th century, well before the rock garden came into being. Until recently, flocks of mandarin ducks were seen on the pond, and Ryoan-ji was known as Oshidoridera, the temple of mandarin ducks. Unfortunately, the ducks have disappeared. And again, a sturdy pole construction supports the old conifer...

 

And a final picture of cherries in full bloom by the pond - they form such festive contrast to the ascetic rock garden nearby.

 

 

Earth-bound clouds in Tokyo

Yoyogi Park in Tokyo - several groups were reserving their hanami picnic spots in the park early in the morning, despite the cold. The blossoms of Prunus x yedoensis appear before the leaves and so are regarded as "earth-bound clouds" by the Japanese.

 

The Japanese imperial throne might have the Chrysanthemum as its symbol, but there is nothing more essentially Japanese than sakura, the cherry blossom. As Matthew Wilson recently wrote in his excellent article in Financial Times, admiring sakura is very deeply rooted in the Japanese soul, associated as they are with the cultural tradition of mono no aware, the awareness of the impermanence and transience of things, and consequent restrained sadness for their passing. What a beautiful concept in our world all too much fixated on permanent youth - and related quick 'remedies'.

 

From early March in the south to late May in the furthest parts of the country in the north, the sakura zensen, or the cherry blossom front, rides like a frothy wave through the country, with daily weather reports carefully keeping track on the best dates for viewing. Hanami picnics are planned accordingly, and the best parks get very busy, people sitting on their tarps from early mornings to reserve place for the rest of the party to arrive. While in Tokyo, several groups were already spreading their waterproof sheets on the ground in Yoyogi park early in the morning, even if the weather was freezing cold. Patience is a characteristic to be connected with Japanese arts, but it comes handy in other aspects of life there as well.

 

 

The Japan Weather Association publishes a special forecast for the sakura bloom in the whole country from south to north, you can find it here. Sakura are celebrated in parks and temples all over the country, making the ritual of 'hanami' the floral event with most participants on the whole planet.

You are never too young to have your first sakura portrait taken... from Hama-rikyu park in Tokyo.

 Everywhere, people ask passers-by to take pictures of them in front of especially beautiful cherry specimens. We found this one at the Arisugawanomiya Memorial Park in Hiro-o (and took some family photos in front of it, too).

 

 Another beautiful cherry tree in the same park...

 ... and a whole family sitting down for a picnic under it, in the middle of the working week. People tend to take time off during the sakura peak season to celebrate hanami with their family and friends.

In Japan, one glorious blooming season is enough to captivate a whole nation... While so many other plants are bred for repeat flowering these days, I'm sure that even the most profit-hungry nurserymen understand how unnatural this would be in the case of cherries (and lilacs, and so many other harbingers of spring) that would loose their special magic if they would bloom repeatedly the warm season through...mono no aware, again.

 

The spirited city wilderness of Meiji Jingu

One of the stone arch bridges in the Meiji shrine's forest, with sunlight dancing on layers of dense greenery behind.

Wandering around the paths of Meiji shrine's forest, it is easy to forget that one is in the heart of one of world's busiest cities.

With its namesake Shinto shrine and the Gyoen imperial gardens incorporated in its vast area, this forest was created in honor of Emperor Meiji and Empress Shoken as a place for their souls to dwell in after they passed away in 1912 and 1914.

With 100 000 saplings of different varieties from all over Japan, the grounds were carefully planted by hand to form an eternal forest that recreates itself. Today, the saplings have both matured and reproduced, creating layers upon layers of luxurious green that reach to the sun and sway gently in the wind, muffling effectively the sounds of the daily Tokyo life around.  Edited as the forest is - most of the trees are pruned so skillfully that it takes a lot of observing to detect it - there is an air of remarkable tranquility, or even wilderness, while walking under the vast canopies.

According to Shinto belief Kami, the divine spirit, can be found in mythology, nature and in human beings. Rather generously, the number of these spirits is unlimited, which explains the many Shinto temples from the tiniest to the huge that form such an integral part of the Japanese landscape. With a magnificent resting place as this, I can imagine not just the Emperor's and Empress's souls wandering around the forest of Meiji shrine, but also countless little other Kamis fluttering around the sakura blossoms and newly sprung leaves of the Japanese maples.

 The inner yard at the Meiji Jingu (which means shrine in Japanese), with a large camphor tree on the left.

The Meiji shrine is a popular venue for Shinto weddings; while we visited, a wedding party entered the shrine, all dressed in beautiful traditional Japanese clothes. 

Another camphor tree, surrounded by a wall of prayers left by visitors.  

 

A teahouse in Gyoen, the imperial garden, with strictly pruned mounds of azaleas in front.

 

 

In the Azalea garden, large arching shrubs were already starting to bloom.

Emperor Meiji designed the Gyoen garden, and Empress Shoken enjoyed fishing in this large pond. I wonder how she fished - with a rod and worms? Somehow, a fishing Empress is a funny but quite sympathetic thought...

 

View from the further end of the large pond - with large Japanese maples sending out their delicate branches above the water.

The Iris Garden, containing over 1500 plants of 150 varieties in different blue shades... when in bloom in early to mid June, they form a river of flowers - surely an amazing sight that I would love to see one day. (mental note: would love to build a river of irises in my garden, some day.)

One of the walkways in the shadow of the century old, now mature trees of the Meiji Jingu's forest.