Bonsai Garden
Here around 60 bonsai from the museum’s collection are displayed outdoors in an elegant Japanese-style garden replete with a boat-shaped central pond and a tranquil azumaya (arbor). The selection is ever-changing, being revised each week and regularly featuring some of the Omiya Bonsai Art Museum’s most treasured trees.
To truly appreciate a bonsai means giving it full, undivided attention, and the garden’s design encourages this: trees are displayed atop simple wooden plinths that do not distract from the bonsai themselves, and each exhibit is given plenty of breathing room. Depending on their design, certain bonsai are arranged so that they may be viewed from all angles. A Japanese white pine that is one of the largest bonsai in the collection, when out in the garden, is placed upon an equally sizable turntable that enables different parts of the tree to receive optimal sunlight as needed.
The full beauty of this garden is revealed when taken in as a whole: the museum’s second-floor terrace affords a full bird’s-eye view of the garden’s asymmetrical design. While photography is forbidden down in the garden itself, it is encouraged from this splendid vantage point.