World’s Most Beautiful Botanical Gardens in Japan and Korea

World’s Most Beautiful Botanical Gardens in Japan and Korea

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By Mr Ghaz, February 4, 2011

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World’s Most Beautiful Botanical Gardens in Japan and Korea

Gardens in Japan represent a very long cultural heritage, the creation of gardens being considered a major art form, reflecting the importance of nature. The essential components of a Japanese garden include various forms of stone, sand, water and individually placed plants, composed in a stylized arrangement. The individual stones, often chosen to represent mountains, are chosen with great care, their degree of erosion having symbolic significance. In the dry garden of Zen Buddhism, stone can be used to represent water, as can the raked surface of sand in gardens traditionally used for contemplation by scholars, nobles and monks. Plants traditionally associated with Japanese gardens include pines and mosses cultivated as ornamentals. Among the most famous of the Japanese traditional gardens are the Golden and Silver Pavilions of Kyoto. Kyoto was the country’s capital from 794 to 1603, and has an outstanding array of ancient sanctuaries and garden; the Kyoto Prefecture Botanical Garden currently has the largest living collection of plants held by a Japanese botanical garden, with 12,000 species.

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The first botanic garden in Japan was established in the Edo period. In 1638, Miyakuen, which means the medicinal garden, was created by the Tokugawa feudal government. It was moved to its current location in Tokyo in 1684 and became the Botanic Garden of the University of Tokyo in 1879. All the other botanic gardens of Japan were developed after the Meiji era (1868-1912), when Japan was eager to absorb Western culture and knowledge. Sixteen botanic gardens were established during this time and a second major period of botanic garden development took place in the years after 1960.

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