Kiyosumi Gardens

Kiyosumi Garden is a traditional Japanese stroll garden located in Fukagawa, Tokyo. It was constructed along classic principles in 1878–85, during the Meiji Period, by the shipping financier and industrialist Iwasaki Yatarō. By subtle hints in path construction and placement the visitor is led on a walk around the lake. Water-worn boulders were brought in from all over Japan, to give the garden its character; hills and dry waterfalls were constructed with them and two sequences of them form stepping-stones across small inlets of the lake, which almost completely fills the garden, allowing a pathway of many picturesque episodes around its perimeter. In fact only a narrow band of perimeter planting screens the garden from the structures along Kiyosumi Dori. There are three big islands and a teahouse on the pond. The garden covers an area of about 81,000 square metres.