There are several types of Japanese gardens in Japan, although it should be noted that the different styles are not mutually exclusive at all.

It is often the case that there are several types of gardens near an institution, residence or church. It is easy to come across a mix of different styles in each garden. There are no rigid rules for designing Japanese gardens, as gardeners could safely immerse themselves in the richness of garden traditions.

Original Japanese gardens

The original plan for creating the gardens was to create an environment that would allow us to bring the gods closer to us. These gardens are usually designed to be walkable. Depending on the area to be developed as a garden, these gardens can cover several huge areas. Ponds in gardens were often also designed to be large in size, as boating was a very popular activity at the time of the development of Japanese gardens.

Japanese garden

It is true for virtually all Japanese gardens that the layout of the gardens tries to evoke a sense of true natural landscapes, which is why these gardens were also referred to as man-made hill gardens, as they contained elevated areas, whether mountains or hills. It was also fashionable in many gardens to recreate well-known (even fictitious) places.

Japanese garden planning

These recreated landscapes, even literary works, could have been imaginary, wonderful places. The symbolic depiction of the sight of the distant landscape allowed the visitor to travel through the beautiful gardens in complete freedom, letting go of their fantasy world. To create millions like fairy-tale worlds, no other tool was used than the symbol system associated with the Japanese gardens we had learned before.