Zen Gardening - Softcover

Sunniva Harte

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1862054584 ISBN 13: 9781862054585

Publisher: Collins & Brown, 2002

Synopsis

Reflects the increasing interest in Eastern philosophies on the creation of natural balance in the garden; Provides detailed practical examples showing how to imbue your garden with the elements of harmony and peace; Gardens inspired by Zen are the ideal antidote to today's busy lifestyle - an oasis of calm and tranquillity - and require very little maintenance; Zen gardens are for contemplation, reflecting the beauty of nature and the aesthetic sense of the gardener. Originally created in Japanese monasteries around the twelfth century, their beauty comes from their simplicity and the precise arrangement of rocks, gravel, water and plants. Using as few or as many plants as required, Zen gardens also provide an eco-friendly alternative to the old-fashioned lawn, often requiring little or no water. For those with a limited area, Zen gardens create the illusion of space and freedom. Zen Gardening simplifies the principles of this art and reveals the meaning of the different elements, putting every aspect of creating a Zen garden at the hands of today's gardeners. Zen gardening need not mean ripping up your garden and starting from scratch. Nor need it involve replacing your lawn with white gravel. It may simply be that a dark patch of foliage needs a powerful white stone to provide yang and balance the view. This beautiful book includes chapters on Elements and their Symbolism, Water - Creating Balance and Tranquillity, Rocks and Stones - Creating Space and Energy and Sand and Gravel - Creating Simplicity and Serenity. There are also chapters on Plants for the Zen Garden, Architectural Elements and Ornaments. giving practical advice and showing how modern gardens can be transformed into beautiful, harmonious spaces.

About this title

Review:

A Zen garden can be an oasis in a busy world, a space of calm, tranquility, and beauty, a thing apart from the hectic pace of our lives. Whether a tiny courtyard or larger outdoor space, Zen gardens have in common their few, simple elements arranged to honor nature and celebrate its changing seasons. The design of Zen Gardening contributes to our understanding of the aesthetic, as it is as artful and focused as a Zen garden itself.

How to create such harmony and peace outside our own doors and windows? Sunniva Harte's book inspires with numerous large color photos showing whole landscapes devoted to rocks, sand, and water, or cozy gardens with a few vital Zen elements. But Zen gardens are more than raked sand and a few carefully placed rocks: an entire chapter is devoted to plants for Zen gardens. It begins with a quote from the Japanese poet Kikaku--"Full autumn moon on the straw mat, pine shadow"--and goes on to explain how plants have long been valued in Japan for their changing with the seasons and their sensuousness and textural qualities. Ornamental grasses, pines, Japanese maples, iris, bamboo, mosses, and even hostas are shown used in the Zen manner, with instructions on placement, care, and pruning. Harte also gives instruction on design, architecture, pathways, and materials for Zen gardens.

Those who would like to incorporate a bit of the Zen feeling of tranquility into their everyday gardens, but who don't want to do a total garden remodel, will appreciate the chapter on ornamentation. Lovingly chosen ornaments enhance the Zen atmosphere, serving symbolic purposes as well as working as focal points and humanizing the garden. A variety of simple additions--such as stone urns and lanterns, carved Buddhas, trays of special rocks, decorative wrappings, water basins, and bonsai--personalize and lend an aura of Zen tranquility, much as Zen poet Ikkyu's poem does: "When, just as they are, white dewdrops gather on scarlet maple leaves, regard the scarlet beads!" --Valerie Easton

From the Inside Flap:

Like a restorative balm, Zen gardening is an antidote to the stresses of our busy modern lifestyles. A Zen garden can create a feeling of space in the smallest of city plots, or import a sense of order and spirit of tranquility and calm.

The classical Zen Gardens were devised by Japanese monks and are revered as national monuments. In explaining and interpreting the basis of the philosophy and its symbolism, Zen gardening allows gardeners to benefit from the purity of thought that took its traditional exponents decades of dedication and contemplation to define.

The Zen Garden puts us in touch with the elements. A single rock might represent the strength of mountains, clipped bushed the billowing clouds, gravel or slate moving water; each stone, each ornament is chosen and placed to provide wabi-a humble yet refined beauty. But Zen principles can equally be interpreted to bring balance, and therefore greater harmony and a sense of peace.

Whether you fully embrace Zen or simply apply its ideas to the layout and upkeep of a more conventional design, your garden will gain a vital natural equilibrium. A Zen-influenced garden is environmentally friendly-raked sands is less demanding on water than a lawn, and pesticides are anathema to the Zen philosophy-and a pleasure not a tyranny to tend.

About this edition

• Publisher: Collins & Brown
• Publication date: 2002
• ISBN 10: 1862054584
• ISBN 13: 9781862054585
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 160