Asia Pacific Jul 10, 2021
While Hong Kong is one of the most densely packed places on earth, there is still considerable space to grow food locally.
Lifestyle May 18, 2019
Shifting landscapes: The state of traditional Japanese gardens
by Stephen Mansfield
My neighbor's garden is a wonder to behold. Where you might expect to find trim box hedges, bamboo fences, subtle rock arrangements, junipers, conifers and pine, there are garden gnomes, an ornamental concrete wheelbarrow, pots of begonia, hanging baskets of pansies and an iron ...
Books May 18, 2019
'Cutting Back': The collected wisdom of an aesthetic pruner
by Stephen Mansfield
Breezy, frequently humorous and self-scolding, Leslie Buck's "Cutting Back: My Apprenticeship in the Gardens of Kyoto" is a poignant look at the storied Japanese world of professional gardening.
Books / Reviews | ESSENTIAL READING FOR JAPANOPHILES May 18, 2019
'The Art of the Japanese Garden': Green-fingered insight into Japanese garden spaces
by Steve John Powell
By delving into the history, development and intricate details of Japanese gardens, "The Art of the Japanese Garden" brings new appreciation and awareness to the art form.
Books / Reviews Dec 30, 2017
This no garden variety book on Zen practice
by Stephen Mansfield
The over-application of the term Zen to describe everything from interior design to restaurant menus pored over by celebrities and fashionistas to the expression a "Zen moment" can be tiresome. Zen Gardens and Temples of Kyoto, by John Dougill, Photography by John Einarsen. 144 pages TUTTLE PUBLISHING, ...
Travel Dec 15, 2017
Leave ordinary life behind at a Japanese garden in Oregon
by Kajsa Skarsgard
Visitors to the Portland Japanese Garden are invited to engage their senses in the subtleties of nature.
Voices | HOTLINE TO NAGATACHO Sep 20, 2017
With every new construction in Japan, fewer trees
by Sean Michael Wilson
When houses are demolished, there is a very bad habit here of cutting down all the trees on the plot, leaving the ground cleared and empty for new construction.
World / Science & Health Aug 24, 2017
Urban trees save megacities millions through cleaner air, cooler buildings: study
Trees in cities reduce air pollution, absorb carbon and protect people during heat waves, saving megacities more than $500 million a year in health care, energy costs and environmental protection, according to new research. With 1 in 10 people predicted to live in cities with ...
Books / Reviews May 20, 2017
'Japanese Garden Notes': An informative photo book
by Iain Maloney
"Japanese Garden Notes" is a gorgeous photo book that introduces aspects of traditional Japanese garden design. It walks the reader through the philosophy of "space and passage," "function and art" and "intent and time," explaining why certain details recur and the emotions they are ...
Books / Reviews Jan 14, 2017
'Daimyo Gardens': a new perspective on Tokyo's venerable green spaces
by Stephen Mansfield
Though overshadowed by Kyoto, which boasts more than 200 listed gardens, Tokyo likely has the foremost concentration of formal gardens of any Asian capital. Daimyo Gardens, by Yozaburo Shirahata, Translated by Imoto Chikako and Lynne E. Riggs.209 pages INTERNATIONAL RESEARCH CENTER FOR JAPANESE STUDIES KYOTO, Nonfiction. Garden ...
Books / Reviews | ESSENTIAL READING FOR JAPANOPHILES Aug 6, 2016
by Stephen Mansfield
The powerful ambiguities of dry landscape arrangements, the inevitable questions they raise in relation to what constitutes a garden, the profundity of concepts and principals, many of them deriving from Taoism and Zen, never fail to baffle the uninitiated. Francoise Berthier, a professor of ...
National Jun 5, 2016
Visitors to Korakuen Garden in Okayama, one of the nation's top three Japanese gardens, exceeded 800,000 for the first time in 15 years, thanks to a surge in tourism and events to lure young people. Attendance hit 817,260 in fiscal 2015 ended in March. The ...