- Create Your Own Japanese Garden Masterpiece
Our experiences offer hands-on experience in various aspects of Japanese garden creation and maintenance. Whether you're interested in building traditional bamboo fences, learning landscape preservation techniques, or creating seasonal decorations, our expert gardeners will guide you through each step of the process.
Garden Care & Garden Making Experience
Living Japanese Gardens
Tondabayashi, Osaka
Set in southern Osaka, close to Kansai International Airport, this experience introduces the living traditions of Japanese gardens through the perspective of a professional gardener. While sharing roots with the famous gardens of Kyoto, the region has developed its own techniques and approaches, offering visitors a broader understanding of Japanese garden culture.
Guests work alongside the gardener and experience the careful practices that shape Japanese landscapes throughout the seasons. Depending on the program, participants learn tree pruning, create traditional sand patterns in a Zen garden, and experience techniques that have been passed down through generations of garden makers. A delicious local lunch featuring ingredients from the region, including its renowned wagyu, can also be enjoyed as part of the experience.
Rather than simply learning practical skills, the experience reveals how Japanese gardens are continually cared for, renewed, and created through patience, observation, and respect for nature.
- He says
“Japanese gardens are not simply beautiful spaces; they create harmony between nature and human life. Every element, from carefully placed stones to pruned trees, tells a story and creates a sense of peace and tranquility. Through these experiences, I hope to share the wisdom and techniques passed down through generations of Japanese gardeners.”
- Professional Gardener
- Shohei Tsukamoto
- With more than 20 years of experience in traditional Japanese garden design and maintenance, the master gardener has dedicated his life to preserving and passing on these time-honored techniques. He has worked on numerous historic gardens and temples throughout Japan, bringing his expertise and passion to these experiences.
Access
30 minutes by train and 15 minutes by taxi from Namba Station
The marker shows the approximate area.
The exact address will be provided when your reservation is confirmed.
Experiences
- Reserve
Japanese Garden Pruning & Zen Sand Experience
38,000 JPY / personWork alongside a professional gardener and discover how Japanese gardens are continually renewed through observation and seasonal care. Prune trees yourself and experience the measured gestures used to draw patterns in a traditional sand garden, choosing to explore both practices or focus more deeply on one.
The three-hour experience in Tondabayashi introduces garden maintenance as more than a technical task: each cut and line is part of an ongoing conversation between the gardener, the landscape, and time. A regional lunch featuring wagyu and a surprise souvenir are included. The experience can proceed in light rain.
- Reserve
Japanese Garden-Making Experience with a Master Gardener
66,000 JPY / personSpend a day with a professional gardener in Tondabayashi, southern Osaka, and discover how a Japanese garden is designed as a living relationship between plants, stone, sand, bamboo, and human care. Review the plan, build a Kennin-ji-style bamboo fence, and shape a practice garden under direct guidance.
The six-hour program offers a practical introduction to the decisions and techniques behind traditional landscape making. Tools, a regional lunch featuring wagyu, and a surprise souvenir are included. Please bring clothing suitable for garden work.
- Reserve
Shimenawa & Kadomatsu-Making Add-On
15,000 JPY / personAround the New Year, add a one-hour seasonal craft session to either Japanese garden program and learn how auspicious decorations are made from natural materials. Under the gardener’s guidance, each participant makes one shimenawa sacred rope and one kadomatsu while discovering the meanings associated with these traditions.
Take both completed decorations home as seasonal expressions of protection, welcome, and renewal. This is an add-on rather than a standalone booking; lunch and the surprise souvenir are provided through the parent garden program.
