Michiko Fujiwara | April 2010 Essay: "The First Step in Garden Design is Creating an Image"
The First Step in Garden Creation: Building the Image (Part 1)
It has been about a year and a few months since I established my second home near the sea in Shimoda City, Shizuoka Prefecture.
When the house was first built, friends who visited would offer comments like, "It's all white, and there's so little furniture, it feels so spacious and like a house studio – it's so refreshing!" It was a rather ambiguous compliment. But by pouring all my energy into arranging the interior last year, I've managed to create an atmosphere that feels somewhat like "my home." And as the inside of the house became more comfortable, I found myself with the leisure to look around, and now the exterior, the garden, feels too bare.
Photos and text by Michiko Fujiwara
Garden Creation… After Much Thought, a Brilliant Idea Emerged
It's not that nothing is planted. I've planted Japanese plum yews all around as a hedge, and the garden is lawn. There were already old persimmon and peach trees, a tall ginkgo, and aucuba, and I've newly planted olive, lemon, lime, and bay laurel trees. I've also bought seedlings of flowers I liked and planted them here and there in the garden. I've planted herbs too. …And yet, it still feels rather bleak. If I were to just plant flowers haphazardly, saying "Oh, this flower is so cute!", it would undoubtedly become a messy garden. I need to approach garden creation more systematically…
—That's it! A house can't be built without blueprints, can it? Even more so, if the client doesn't have an image of the house they want, how can an architect even draw up those blueprints? Even with interiors, if you choose expensive furniture or cute accessories one by one without a plan, the room will just become cluttered. It's the same with gardens!
"Alright, I'm going to create a garden systematically!" I declared with resolve, but while I like flowers, I'm not very knowledgeable about their names, I've never done proper gardening, I have zero knowledge, and no connections. "Where do I even begin...?" After much deliberation, a brilliant idea struck me. I decided to propose a feature for a magazine about "My Garden Creation"! It's a rather audacious idea, but if I did that, the magazine would surely assign a gardener who suits my taste, and with the help of their professional skills and wisdom, things would progress quickly and result in a high-quality garden! This seemed like a brilliant idea, so I immediately consulted a friend who was visiting Shimoda while showing them my garden. My friend said, "I happen to know someone at a perfect magazine," and introduced me to 'BISES' (Bizes Publishing), a pioneering gardening magazine.
The First Step in Garden Creation: Building the Image (Part 2)
I really want a truly (perhaps?) natural garden…
Things moved along smoothly, and it was decided that the process of creating the garden would be serialized over several issues. To prepare for the concrete discussions with the editors and gardeners, I decided to organize my own image of the garden I wanted to create. Simply saying "I'll leave it all to you" or "I like this kind of garden, but I also want that kind of garden" would only confuse those in charge. So, I decided to re-sort the magazine clippings I had collected for creating the image of my current vacation home, focusing on those related to gardens. At the time, I just clipped them without much consideration, thinking, "Oh, this garden is lovely!" or "This atmosphere is nice too." From those, I first selected images of gardens I truly wanted to create. This was the most difficult part, because making a decision means giving up on other options. After broadly deciding on the overall image, I then refined the details, such as "I want to screen this area" or "I want to create an entrance like this." Of course, I didn't just choose dream scenarios; I selected and filed photos that seemed to align reality with my hopes.
The purpose of creating a file is to clearly convey my image to the other party, but that's not all. As I worked on filing, what I was seeking and what I wanted became clearer. That, in itself, could be considered the true objective.
Thus, I arrived at a general image for the garden I wanted to create, based on the currently popular natural garden style, but with a bit more cultivated touch. You could say it's natural, but not *too* natural. I really want a truly (perhaps?) natural garden, but that requires a vast amount of land. If only I had about 300,000 tsubo (approximately 247 acres) of land, like Tasha Tudor, the pioneer of natural gardening! (Even a thousandth of that would be enough).
'BISES' Spring 2010 Issue (No. 65)
(Published by Bizes Publishing / Benesse Corporation)
http://www.belier.co.jp/~bises/
Now, the current issue of 'BISES', the Spring 2010 issue (No. 65), features the meeting where I discussed this material with the gardeners at their office. This issue also reveals the full 'before' state of my garden. And the next issue is scheduled to feature the actual soil preparation and planting work.
I believe this serialized series will be very helpful for gardening beginners like myself, or for anyone who wants to "do something about their garden!" So please take a look!
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