Little Kyoto: A Japanese Garden in Preston

Keen amateur gardener Linda Kidd explains what led her to create an immaculate Japanese garden at her home in Treales, near Preston.

Transcript

00:00This garden didn't evolve until the children flew the nest and I thought right the garden's

00:18mine now because it was just a grass patch so it's all been done from absolutely nothing.

00:30I wanted a garden to come home to to relax in. It's just something to tinker in really and it developed

00:39and somebody gave me a book how to make a Japanese garden for a Christmas present and my interest grew

00:47from there and the more I read and the more I googled the more I wanted to get it as authentic

00:55as possible and in that way it's developed into the garden it is.

01:06And the more I've read the more interested I've become not not just in the way the gardens are but

01:12in the culture the way they live and the respect they have for nature and I think that's what's

01:19the bottom of it all.

01:22Other lanterns are all strategically placed as you enter from the courtyard garden through the moon

01:30gate. The moon has great significance to the Japanese and echoing the moon gate is the moon

01:39bridge and it's so called the moon bridge because when the moon shines on it at night into the clear

01:45water it's the reflection of the full moon.

01:48There's the tea house which I have finally got to being as near as perfect as I can.

02:12The hardest thing to learn was placing the rocks. It's important because the Japanese garden is

02:26basically water, rocks and green plants and the three together make the tranquil atmosphere.

02:35It changes daily and it changes throughout the year.

02:52It's been an absolute godsend especially through Covid. It was so peaceful, so quiet. It was just

03:00wonderful. There was no aeroplanes, there was no traffic. For me it was just paradise.

03:08And I was the only lucky one that could go to Japan every day.

03:16You can't go about it half-hearted but people need to enjoy it, not let it become a task.

03:24So it's a matter of just enjoying every little bit of it.