How to Create a Bonsai Zen Garden

A bonsai zen garden is the perfect way to create a relaxing environment in your home. The miniature trees are known to be therapeutic and can help with stress and anxiety levels. Often kept in offices or on coffee tables, zen gardens are a great way to add a living element to your space. Originally created as aids for meditation, they are now used as a visual tool to teach ancient Eastern principles and concepts.

In the Shinto and Buddhist tradition, trees hold deep spiritual significance. They are believed to have the power to captivate beneficial heavenly flows. Therefore, planting them in gardens invites gods and spirits into your home and provides protection against evil forces. A Bonsai zen garden is designed to emulate a landscape that would be found in nature as well as embody the beauty of the tree itself. These principles are acted out by the stones of the garden as much as they are by the plants themselves.

One of the most famous examples of a Zen garden is the Karesansui Garden at Ryoan-ji temple in Kyoto, Japan. It features a combination of several different elements including rocks, gravel, sand, ornaments and trees. The overall aesthetic of a Zen garden is to be simple, and minimalist.

This is especially important when it comes to the arrangement of the sand and gravel. The sand and gravel should be kept clean, free from leaves and other debris, and regularly raked.