The Japanese Tea Garden

by Marc Peter Keane

Overview

Award-winning Japanese landscape architect Marc Peter Keane traces the history and design of tea gardens from T'ang China to present day.

Almost every Japanese garden is influenced by the tea garden. Drawing on his impressive career of garden construction across the United States and Japan, Marc Peter Keane describes the history, design, and aesthetics of tea gardens, from T'ang China to the present day, with over 115 stunning photographs, floor plans, and illustrations. The most extensive book on this genre ever published in English, The Japanese Tea Garden is a rich resource for garden lovers, historians, and landscape architects.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781611720150
Publisher:	Stone Bridge Press
Publication date:	04/15/2014
Edition description:	Reprint
Pages:	296
Product dimensions:	9.80(w) x 7.90(h) x 1.20(d)

About the Author

Marc Peter Keane, a graduate of Cornell University, is an American landscape architect and author. He lived in Kyoto, Japan, for nearly 20 years, and specializes in Japanese garden design. Presently, he maintains a design office in Ithaca, New York.

He is the author of several books about garden design: Japanese Garden Design (an introduction to the culture and design of Japanese gardens); Sakuteiki: Visions of the Japanese Garden (a translation of Japan's oldest gardening text, co-authored with Prof. Jiro Takei), The Art of Setting Stones (a collection of philosophical essays on gardens), and The Japanese Tea Garden (history and aesthetics of Japanese tea gardens).

Keane has worked as a lecturer in the Department of Environmental Design at the Kyoto University of Art and Design and at Cornell University, and is a fellow at the Research Center for Japanese Garden Art, Kyoto, Japan, and the Institute for Medieval Japanese Studies, New York. He has lectured widely throughout the United States, England, and Japan.

Keane also acted as chairman of Kyoto Mitate International for many years, a non-profit organization that worked to revitalize Kyoto's traditional environments and cultural heritage.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments ii

An Invitation to Tea x

1 a brief history of tea 1

Tang-Dynasty China (618–907) 3
Nara-Period Japan (710–84) 4
Song-Dynasty China (960–1279) 5
Kamakura-Period Japan (1185–1333) 9
Yuan-Dynasty China (1271–1368) 12
Ming-Dynasty China (1368–1644) 12

2 cultural background 19

Garden History 20
Machiya: Merchant Townhouses 23
The Hermit in the City 27
Tea Aesthetics 39

3 muromachi society 43

Bushi: Military Aristocracy 44
Zenso: Buddhist Priests 49
Shonin: Merchants 57
Shokunin/Geinosha: Artisans/Artists 63

4 early development of the roji 67

Early Development of the Tea Garden 68
Shuko: The Tea of Urban Merchants in the Late 15th Century 70
Joo: Wabi and Tea in the Early 16th Century 78
Rikyu: The Creation of the Tea Garden During the Late 16th Century 85

5 from roji to chaniwa: tea gardens in the edo period 117

The Word Roji 118
Tea Gardens in the Early Edo Period 120
Early 17th Century: Furuta Oribe and the Beginnings of Daimyo-cha 120
Mid-17th Century: Kobori Enshu and the Development of Daimyo-cha 133
Late Edo Period: The Codification of Tea Gardens 139

6 extant tea gardens and gardens influenced by tea 57

The Roji of Tea Grand Masters 158
Estate Gardens of Provincial Lords 165
Imperial Gardens 172
Gardens of Merchant Residences 179
20th-Century Private Estates 184
Other Private Residences 189

7 parts of a tea garden 197

Outer Gate: Soto-mon or Roji-mon 198
Tea Path: Roji Michi 201
The Waiting Bench: Koshikake 208
The Middle Gate: Chumon 211
The Water Basin: Tsukubai 216
Stone Lanterns: Ishi-doro 224
Dust Pit: Chiri-ana 225
Privy: Setchin 227
Fences: Kakine 227
Walls: Kabe 232
Garden Well: Ido 232
The Plantings: Ueki 233

Notes 243

Tea Text Summaries 261

Glossary of Garden Terminology 268

Bibliography 276

Index 281

Editorial Reviews

"When Marc Peter Keane describes, with poetry and erudition, the experience of the Japanese garden today, he has no peer."
—Leonard Koren, author of Wabi-Sabi

"Marc Peter Keane is the undisputed American master of Japanese garden scholars. . . . Since tea gardens have had a major impact on the design of Japanese gardens in general, this book is a necessary addition to the library of any serious student. The rest of us will enter with humility —mindful of the small door through which one must crawl into the tea room—and sip slowly."
—New York Times Sunday Book Review

"Impeccably written, erudite without being burdensomely intellectual, what sets Keane’s beautifully measured and considered prose style apart from other garden writers is the carefully created mood of his text, which aspires at times to verbalized contemplation. . . . Likely to remain the standard work on the subject for a very long time to come"
—Stephen Mansfield, Kyoto Journal

"An incredibly beautiful and extremely detailed look at one of the world's most transcendent landscape arts."
—The Avant Gardener (NY)

"For anyone with a serious interest in Japanese gardens this is an essential purchase."
—Graham Hardman , Japanese Garden Society (UK)

"A thoroughly engaging, insightful observer."
—Booklist

From the Publisher

Since tea gardens have had a major impact on the design of Japanese gardens in general, this book is a necessary addition to the library of any serious student. The rest of us will enter with humility—mindful of the small door through which one must crawl into the tea room—and sip slowly.
—The New York Times

Dominique Browning