Our Karesansui Garden Plan

Karesansui literally means dry landscape. A common type of garden which suggests mountains and water using only stones, sand or gravel, and occasionally, plants.

Top of the image is lined with karikome style satsuki azelea or rhododendron shrubs. That wall is the east side.

for example:
Azelea example
Rhododendron example


To the left is the north facing wall. That is the Bonsai gallery. There's a big avocado tree in the top left.

To the right of the drawing is the south wall. This wall has shade so we will plant Camellia japonica there. We found Nuccio's Nurseries where the Huntington Library gets their Camelias and azelias from. The flowers normally come in red, pink, and white.

example:

Camelia example 1

Camelia example 2



There's a pine in the planting area of the patio peninsula. I will probably use Japanese black pine (P.Thunbergii).

Wood patio furniture, two concrete benches near the firepit. Golden bamboo in the top right and bottom right. I will need to install root barriers for these running bamboo. Persimon tree in the island.

There are two stone groupings. The top one is of 3 stones, representing heaven, earth and man. In the Sakuteiki, the Buddhist Trinity 3 stone arrangement is called sanzon butsu no ishi. Today they are called sanzon seki gumi. We will probably use a small succulent ground cover to replace the typical moss that surrounds the stones on the island.

We're using flagstone pattern pavers made by concrete cast and other forms for the patio. The edge of the patio is surrounded by a channel of black river rocks.

I'm not exactly sure what kind of water basin we're going to get but there will be one low to the ground near the entrance.

Obviously below the bridge is raked a grey-white sharp and broken granite sandy gravel representing water coming from the north. shirakawazuna (sand) not real water. Just dry garden.

Karesansui example:
Karesansui example