Native Plants

In her book Japanese Gardens, Irmtraud Schaarschmidt-Richter broke down the composition of traditional Japanese gardens into six elements.

1 - The Flat Surface

2 - Plastic Elements

3 - Moving Elements

4 - Graphic Elements

5 - Details

6 - Background

The flat surface in Japanese gardens occurs in two forms: as level ground, usually covered with sand, gravel or moss; and as the surface of a pond. The flat surface plays a role which is similar to that of white paper in traditional ink paintings, in which the parts of the painting which are left blank are as important as the painted areas.

The term "plastic elements" refers to the sculptural elements in the composition, among these are: mounds of soil, large rocks, trees, shrubs and large perennials such as tall grasses.

Fountains are rarely used in Japanese gardens, the moving elements are usually waterfalls and flowing streams. Plants which sway or rustle in the slightest breeze can be included among the moving elements.

Japanese gardens are closely related to ink paintings, in which line plays a major role. The edge of a pond is often the strongest line in a Japanese garden, and pine tress are often pruned to create striking silhouettes against the sky, even the needles are thinned to emphasize the graphic quality of these trees.

Flowers play a minor role in Japanese gardens, so details are very important. The most obvious details are the lanterns and groups of stones, but it is the play of textures against each other which provide the most important details.

Gardeners often focus on their gardens and ignore backgrounds. In many books about Japanese gardens, the Ryoan-ji garden is described as not having any trees in it, writers focus on the garden within the walls and ignore the trees which tower above the walls, the trees behind the wall are a very important part of this garden. In other gardens, the view of a mountain is as important as anything in the garden, the garden is designed to feature the mountain.

So how do we learn from Japanese gardens, without imitating them? An example is a wildflower meadow, most Western gardeners want a wildflower meadow to be full of blooms throughout the summer, when this rarely happens in nature. The Japanese garden celebrates the passing of the seasons, if you are only going to grow native plants, you will probably have to follow their example and make a virtue

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