Portland Japanese Garden: Part I

In early 2017 I got a call from the then-curator of the Portland Japanese Garden, Sadafumi Uchiyama, who asked for help sourcing bonsai. I coughed up some phlegm—getting over bronchitis that week—and said, “Yes, I’d like that”—cough—“thank you.”

“We need about fifteen bonsai for a display. In two months. Sorry for the short notice—people are asking me every day, where are the bonsai?” A big renovation was underway with new buildings, but unseasonably high rain had caused mudslides in the area, and the project was behind schedule.

The next day, bundled up with a wool hat, heavy coat, and scarf on a summer-like winter day, I tottered up the wooded hill to three modern buildings under construction. This was new. The last time I’d been to the upper area it was an unassuming entrance.

Courtyard at the top of the Portland Japanese Garden, near the entrance, with the new buildings designed by Kengo Kuma. He intended the living roofs to be a “cap to the earth.”

I met Mr. Uchiyama in his office. He told me that the Garden had partnered with the premier Japanese architect Kengo Kuma, who’d been inspired by the Garden’s mission to promote and teach Japanese traditional arts in the west. 

Mr. Uchiyama’s team had already begun planning the bonsai displays when I arrived to consult. In the following weeks I asked local bonsai artists if they’d loan a tree or two, which we staged in two terraces.

Every year since then—in spring, summer and fall—the two terraces have had bonsai. This summer we have several trees on display from the 2024 Pacific Bonsai Expo.

Every week I am there, eager to check with the gardeners, and the bonsai on display. I’ve occasionally mentioned this special place on the blog, but have never posted images of it. This Part I, then, is a photo tour of the Portland Japanese Garden.

Mr. Takuma Tono, who designed the garden in 1963, was lucky in its setting. The mature Douglas Fir forest combined with steep hill sides and softly undulating middle ground make for a rich topography, with a prize view of Mt. Hood adding the element of shakkei, the art of Borrowed Scenery. 

The Garden was sited on the old city zoo. This big pond and waterfall are where the bears were. In the stone walk where I stood to take this photo there’s a few stones that are distinct, subtle but noticeable, in the shape of the Big Dipper: Ursa Major, the Great Bear. 

Evan Cordes, Lead Gardener and my weekly contact for the bonsai on display, strolling beneath the 200-foot Douglas Firs. 

Koi at the base of the waterfall.

The Garden has five distinct gardens. The Natural Garden—featured here and the next few photos—is my favorite, a quiet meander through woods and shrub understory of intermixed native and Japanese species. This changing walkway makes you notice where you put your feet down, and keeps you looking in different directions.

The Sand and Stone Garden.

The Flat Garden.

This is one of the world’s most photographed trees—a dissectum Japanese Maple. Often there is a line of photographers.

Part II will be about the changing bonsai displays at the Garden.

These last eight years have been memorable, but the beginning especially so. The day before the upper area reopened they held a celebration. I had a free pass and looked forward to it. On leaving the evening before, amid a tangle of construction equipment, booms putting last pieces of roofing up, building materials scattered around and everything coated in mud, I had an unworthy thought—this will NEVER get cleaned up in time. A guy was just beginning with a pressure washer on the muddy stones, at the far end of the courtyard.

Arriving the next day for the celebration, the place was spotless. 

More on this story in the second post: Portland Japanese Garden: Part II