Portland Japanese Garden
— — a garden the city walks slower in.
Not only on a wall.
“Twelve acres on a wooded hillside above the Rose City, opened in 1967 and often called one of the most authentic Japanese gardens outside Japan. Five garden styles step through the site: a stroll pond, a tea garden, a flat garden, a sand and stone garden, and a natural garden. Maples turn red in mid-November under a slow drizzle. Visitors are asked to keep their voices down. The Cultural Village by Kengo Kuma, finished in 2017, hangs over the trees on the upper terrace. Even the gravel has been raked by hand. from the studio
Portland Japanese Garden, on ceramic.
Each tile is finished by hand in our Knoxville studio. Artwork is slowly infused into the ceramic surface under high heat and pressure, and rests beneath a thin glossy finish. The colour lives in the surface, not on top of it.
Pick any four 4-inch tiles — National Parks you've been to, a Smokies set, the four seasons of one place. $ for a set of , cork-backed, ready to live on the table.
The place, in three passes.
The Portland Japanese Garden occupies 12 acres in Washington Park, on a wooded slope of the West Hills above downtown Portland. The garden opened to the public in 1967 to a design by Professor Takuma Tono of Tokyo Agricultural University. Five distinct garden styles step through the site: the Strolling Pond Garden, the Tea Garden, the Flat Garden, the Sand and Stone Garden, and the Natural Garden. In 2017 the garden completed a Cultural Village expansion designed by Kengo Kuma, the Tokyo architect of the new National Stadium. The site draws roughly 500,000 visitors a year.
The garden runs through four clear seasons. Cherry blossoms light up the upper terrace in late March and early April. Iris and azalea peak in May. Japanese maples turn red in mid-November, the season the staff describes as the garden's most photographed. Snow on the Heavenly Falls a few times each winter closes the upper paths briefly. The site stays open year round on a reduced winter schedule. Quiet mornings on weekdays and the last hour before closing are the times the garden returns to the unhurried pace its design assumes.
The garden is open daily except Tuesdays, with seasonal hours; timed-entry tickets are recommended and frequently sell out for the cherry blossom and maple seasons. A free shuttle runs from the parking lot at the foot of the hill up to the entrance every few minutes. The Umami Cafe in the Cultural Village serves matcha and seasonal sweets with a view across the garden roofs to the city. The garden adjoins the International Rose Test Garden and the Hoyt Arboretum, so visitors often pair the three on a single afternoon.