The Gyokusen’inmaru Garden in the Kanazawa-jo Castle Park (Kanazawa-city)

This "Daimyo" garden, which has a circular pond, three central islands and circulating walking paths, is called "Gyokusen’inmaru Garden" and is located in the outer ring of Kanazawa-jo Castle Park, in the centre of Kanazawa City (Ishikawa Prefecture of Japan).

 

"Daimyo" means a great feudal lord of Samurai and Daimyo gardens are built for social events and pastime such as tea ceremonies, boating and moon-watching parties by the feudal lords of each domain in the Edo period when Tokugawa Shogunate Family was in power (1603-1868). 

As each clan competed with each other, the landscape design techniques developed, and it is said that Japanese garden design techniques reached their zenith during this period.

The "Ishigaki" stone-walls and the ash-gray "Sanjyukken Nagaya" (30 terraced fortress-house) on the rear hill beautifully enhance the elegant high-and-low landscape of this garden.

This garden was created in the early Edo period in the Gyokusen-in-maru area of the Kanazawa Castle, which was the residence of the Maeda family, the lords of Kaga Hyakumangoku (the wealthy Kaga Domain with a net worth of 1 million koku of rice).

The garden was abandoned in the Meiji period (1868-1912) and its appearance was mostly lost. Its restoration work began in 2013 and was completed in 2015, based on the results of excavations carried out over a five-year period from 2008, as well as the researches of its remained drawings, documents and other similar Daimyo-garden examples.