(The Katsura Monastery Garden -- continued)
I had the contractors who excavated for the house next door and for the house across the street unload in my yard the boulders and stones they would otherwise have had to haul off. I brought home stones from the glacial till at my sister’s camp Down East. I picked up other stones here and there when no one would mind. Fortunately, there are plenty of stones all over Maine.
Sometimes I see stones I would like to have in the garden and develop “rock lust.” My friends laugh at me, but the stone “mountains,” stone focal points, and stone-formed waterways give my garden complete authenticity and natural beauty.
Stones and boulders are important
Japanese garden designers do not just place a stone where they think it will look good. Before placing stones, one must be sure that they look natural from every possible aspect. Shape, texture, size, and groupings are as important as location.
Designers try to identify the personality of the rock, so to speak, by finding the stone’s best features to present. They then dig a hole large enough to bury the stone one-third beneath the ground surface. This gives the impression that the stones have been there forever and are there because they belong there, regardless of the point from which they are seen. Stones may be grouped, generally in odd numbers, to simulate mountains or islands.
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Paths frequently are created by placing in a line stones to walk on. The line can be straight, move at right angles, or curve. With each change, a new perspective and focal point are brought into view. As a general rule, paths of grass have no stones, wood, or other materials to make their sides. Bricks are unknown. Whether for walkways of stone or paths of grass, as the wife of a Japanese garden designer in Portland put it, this means that weeding is just a natural part of life.
Shrubs and Trees in Japanese Gardens
The use of shrubs and small trees is also extremely important. Once again, proper scale is essential. So are color, size, shape, texture, and placement. Selecting and placing shrubs and small trees are an art form. If shrubs or small trees grow too large, the essential scale ratio of garden to reality is destroyed. If shrubs are too small or are miniature, they take forever to grow and leave expanses of grass that beg to be replaced with ground cover.
Ground covers are great, but not always of the right height for a given space. Moreover, if one looks carefully, the objects in a Japanese garden are usually set in expanses of grass, not ground cover. Color requires careful thought. Since flowers and other sources of bright colors generally are not used, apart from blooming plants like rhododendrons, the various shades of green and how they play against each other, along with texture, take on unexpected significance.
I hate to trim shrubs and shape trees. Somehow, I can even hear the crying and pain-filled weeping of hedges and branches when I trim them, so reluctant am I to interfere with Nature. (I’m serious about that. I hate to interfere.)