Book reviews by Martin Owen
The Modern Japanese Garden,
Stephen Mansfield, Kengo Kuma, Mira Locher, Tim Richardson, Masuno Shunmyo, Pico Iyer,
Thames and Hudson, London 202
Modern Japanese Gardens
Shinobu Sawada, Tadafumi Aoza Edited by Louise Nordström,
ACCArtbooks, Woodbridge, 2023
These two books, with very similar titles, were very easy for me to purchase as contemporary garden design in Japan is one of my major interests. The books although their titles are quite accurate are actually very different and both find valuable and different purposes on my bookshelf.
In the Autumn 2025 edition of Shakkei, I reviewed Christian Tasgold’s Turning gardens in Japan into Japanese Gardens”. It is a study of the history of Japanese gardens form the start of modern Japan, ie since the Meiji period. I said in the review that it was not a coffee table book. Stephen Mansfield’s The Modern Japanese Garden is the heavily illustrated book that complements Tasgold’s paper. Mansfield is an excellent photographer who lives in Japan. He has recorded gardens that have been made and maintained or modified since the end of the 19th Century to the present day. Mansfield’s photographs are accompanied by informative text ands ome very good essays by leading experts on modern Japanese gardens and design. It starts with the gardens like Murin-An designed by Oagawa Jihei IiV and its owner Arimoto Yagawa built at the end of the 19th Century. There are good examples of gardens of the first half ot the 20th century like the 1930 Yamamoto-Tei, and one of my personal favourite places to visit, the 1941 Nezu Museum garden.
Part 2 covers gardens from 1945 to the present day. As one might expect there is coverage of the big names in modern Japanese Garden design like Mirei Shigemori and Masuno Shunmyo, who also contributes an essay to the volume. It also covers work which might be considered more land art or architectural that horticultural. I am pleased to see Sugimoto’s Enuoro Observatory (2017) included,. Some might find Watanabe Sei Makoto’s Carbon Fibre Garden (1996) quite a challenging inclusion. The works of the architect Tadao Ando are also included as are garden areas around significant contemporary public or corporate architecture.This, in common with the other book, is not a book you will read just once, but a book to go back to for inspiration and provocation time and again.
Shinobu Sawada, and Tadafumi Aoza’s Modern Japanese Gardens is a very different tiltle.
The book draws heavily on the publication Niwa Gardens, a leading Japanese periodical. Modern Japanese Gardens showcases designs spanning the breadth of Japan—from secluded residential homes and sacred temple grounds, restaurants hotels, shops and commercial spaces. While some embrace centuries-old traditions, others boldly reimagine the form with contemporary vision. Despite their differences, each garden bears the unmistakable imprint of Japanese heritage, crafted by visionaries whose artistry commands worldwide acclaim. The photographs are inspiring to anyone trying to make a domestic scale Japanese style garden of their own. The articles on individual gardens include layout plans and plant lists. I must confess that I read the book with an online version of RHS Plantfinder by my side.
In the Summer and Spring 2021 editions of Shakkei I wrote about following contemporary gardens on social media. Many of my favourite follows (including Niwa Garden Magazine itself) are here. Much of the magazine is available on patreon. Having the translated text from the magazine is useful, and it fas given me more people to follow.
If you are not following the Instagram account of Tadafumi Aoza , niwa_japan then you are missing a treat that complements owning this book. You can subscribe to the magazine in English using their Patreon account www.patreon.com/NiwaJapan
