How to Bring an Asian Feel to Your Garden
How do you feel about the way your backyard or garden is looking at the moment? Do you feel as though it needs a bit more of a “wow” factor? Do you want it perhaps to look more unique than other gardens in your neighborhood? Of course, there are many, many ways that you could achieve these things, but why not go for something a bit different and bring an Asian atmosphere to your garden or yard space?
Asia is a huge continent containing many countries and cultures, so what exactly are we referring to when we talk about bringing an “Asian feel”? We’ll explain in a bit more detail below.
1. Stone and “Zen”
Many Asian gardens like to make use of stone in one form or another. For the more natural use or larger rocks for rockeries combined with water features, read on to point number 2. If you’re pursuing a more definitively Japanese or Chinese style, then a stone-dominated zen garden is a good idea. Create impressive exteriors with stone paving, bring order and symmetry to your open spaces with raked pebbles and stones, introduce stone sculptures and statues.
The main idea behind stone and zen gardens is to create a sense of balance and harmony. In a hot and often dry country like Australia, such a garden can be a good, hardy alternative to trying to keep a thirsty, lush green garden.
2. Natural-Looking Rockeries and Water Features
If you like the look of rock and stone, but don’t want to create the stone-dominant look of a zen garden, then look more to the traditions of Southern China. Rocks feature prominently in Chinese gardens, where they are placed seemingly haphazardly, but they are actually intricately placed in order to create a sense of real nature and random order.
They are often placed alongside water, sometimes to create natural-looking waterfalls, small fish ponds and even larger lakes where space permits. No two rocks ever seem to look the same, and one gets the sense that even though you know you’re walking in a purposefully designed garden space, you could actually be walking somewhere entirely wild.
3. Simplicity
Asian gardens are known most of all for their overall simplicity in design and their preference for the more natural look. Where an English-style garden’s splendor can be found in the bright colors of its flowers, the verdancy of its trees, the quality of the lawns, and so on, an Asian garden finds a sublime beauty in the seemingly ordinary: water, stone, natural greenery, and life.
So, if you want to create a more effective Asian vibe in your garden space, always keep things simple, whether you do that through Japanese minimalism, or through Chinese “planned nature.”
4. Tailor Your Plant Choices
You’ll want some typically Asian plant choices to help your garden look the part. Good tree choices include willows, black pines, Swiss mountain pinse, or Japanese maples. Fruit trees with peaches or plums are another common choice for Chinese gardens, and you could complement any water spaces you’ve created with stunning blue hostas. Water lilies could be another nice choice for more open ponds if you have space.
The key with an Asian garden is not to plant things in deliberate beds or in rows. The goal should always be to end up with a garden that also looks more like a natural ecosystem. Don’t get too wrapped up in the more English style of orderly planting.
5. Consider “Architecture”
Finally, to add a more Asian feel directly, you could look into structures built in the Chinese or Japanese traditions such as curved bridges over your water features, pagoda structures, zen sculptures, as well as gates, arbors, perhaps even a tea house if you feel so inclined.
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Image: https://pixabay.com/photos/chinese-park-park-chinese-calm-1263101/
