When planning a garden for your New England home, the sheer variety of options for different plants, decor, and hardscaping available to you can be very overwhelming. One thing that can help you come up with a garden plan is choosing a theme, and a very popular theme is the Japanese style garden.
This particular type of garden design creates a stylized landscape that captures the peaceful essence of nature. Japanese gardens make use of carefully arranged rocks, bushes, trees, water features, and gravel or sand raked to give the appearance of water ripples.
Traditionally a Japanese garden design was such that it could be viewed from a special place, such as your porch or patio. The traditions of garden design are taken seriously; the Chinese brought gardening to Japan, and it is only appropriate to honor that history with a piece in your own garden, such as this Chinese-inspired statue.
There are several different styles of Japanese garden to consider for your own home:
- Tea gardens are primarily designed to create a harmonious atmosphere, using rustic materials, low doors, and a calming, winding path. There is typically an outer garden that encloses guests for a tea ceremony and a small inner garden that you can look at and contemplate. Lanterns and water features are great additions to this type of garden.
- For a low-maintenance Japanese-inspired garden, go with the natural style that uses flat stones instead of bridges over water features and doesn’t include man-made elements like lanterns.
- Strolling pond gardens revolve around a central pond and a wandering path, including benches and sculptures and even bridges. These gardens are great for quiet contemplation or romantic evenings.
Marvin Gardens is well-equipped to help you with your Japanese inspired garden. Visit us to see our collection of garden design accessories to inspire your own design.
