10 Beautiful Gardens Around the World to Inspire Creativity
From the first civilization, creative minds have sought out nature and tamed it for inspiration and well-being. Here are 10 beautiful gardens around the world to inspire creativity.
Humans have always been inspired and learned from nature. Over time, man has gone from hunting and gathering to farming. As people started making gardens for survival, so did they start making gardens to inspire creativity and well-being.
Many studies have found the benefits to back up the long history of seeking nature for creativity and well-being. Here are just some of the benefits of spending time in nature. To make sure these benefits last, it’s important to practice habits that support the natural world.
Benefits
- Nature can enhance creative ways of thinking.
- Plants may boost productivity.
- Gardening can have a positive impact on mental health and promote well-being.
- Two hours a week in nature can improve health and well-being.
- Plants may sharpen attention and improve mood.
French painter, Claude Monet, loved nature. He believed it was important to surround himself with it saying, “My wish is to stay always like this, living quietly in a corner of nature.” He spent 43 years tending to his garden, painting the changing light and the passing of the seasons.
His garden appears in dozens of his paintings, most notably featuring the water lilies in the pond, the Japanese bridge, and a weeping willow tree.
His garden at Giverny still stands today and has been a historical monument since 1976. Foundation Claude Monet has preserved and added to the garden by purchasing the neighboring land. Visitors have access to the gardens and the house that was also home to famous French painter Blanche Hoschedé.
Koishikawa Korakuen (小石川後楽園, Koishikawa Kōrakuen) is a seventeenth-century garden in Koishikawa, Bunkyō, Tokyo. Built in the early Edo Period (1600-1867), it is one of three surviving gardens from the time.
The name comes from a poem encouraging “senyū kōraku” (先憂後楽), which means “hardship now, pleasure later.” Like many Japanese gardens, the designer wanted to capture the essence of famous landscapes in miniature form.
It’s beautiful throughout every season but especially gorgeous during the plum season from mid-February through March and the cherry blossom season from late March to early April.
Las Pozas, which means ‘the pools’, is a surrealistic garden near Xilitla village, San Luis Potosí, a seven-hour drive north of Mexico City. British poet Edward James, known for his support of the surrealist art movement, created it as a ‘Garden of Eden.’
The garden sits in a subtropical rainforest and features natural waterfalls, trails, and pools interlaced with towering surrealist sculptures. Some are up to four stories tall. It’s an incredible surrealistic labyrinth mixing the natural world with man-made designs where reality is displaced by fantasy.
Humble Administrator's Garden (Suzhou, China)
The Humble Administrator’s Garden in Suzhou, China, also known as the ‘Garden of the Unsuccessful Politician’, is a Unesco World Heritage site considered to be one of the finest gardens in China.
It was the home and garden of Lu Guimeng, a Tang Dynasty scholar known for creating a new style of rhyme poetry with his poet friend Pi Rixiu.
The garden resembles a Chinese water village and features many pavilions and bridges in a maze of connected pools. Throughout its history, it’s inspired many creative minds like Cao Xueqin, author of the Dream of the Red Chamber, and Wen Zhengming, a painter and poet regarded as one of the Four Masters of Ming painting.
San Grato Park, located between Monte San Salvatore and Monte Arbostora, is a collection of botanical gardens overlooking Lake Lugano. It hosts the largest and most diverse collection of azaleas, rhododendrons, and conifers in the area.
There are five trails to explore and soak in, each with a different theme including, the “Art Trail” garden to inspire creativity. The trail themes include botanic, rest, sensory, panoramic, and one dedicated to fairy tales.
Kenrokuen Garden in Kanazawa, Japan, is of the finest examples of Japanese gardens. It took 200 years to complete and was once the outer garden of Kanazawa Castle nearby.
It’s one of the ‘Three Great Gardens of Japan,’ making it a perfect garden to inspire creativity. With each passing season, the garden has a different personality giving it its second name, “garden of six elements.”
The name is also derived from the “Chronicles of the Famous Luoyang Gardens” (洛陽名園記), a book by the Chinese poet Li Gefei, and stands for the six attributes of a perfect landscape: spaciousness, seclusion, artifice, antiquity, waterways, and panoramas.
Nongnooch Tropical Garden (Pattaya, Thailand)
Located in Na Chom Thian, Thailand, Nong Nooch Tropical Botanical Garden was designed as a fruit plantation but was quickly turned into a wildlife conservation. It is also a major scientific center dedicated to cycads, with its own Cycad Gene Bank.
The garden features a long list of activities including, a small zoo, martial arts show, religious ceremonies, art exhibits, massages, and more. There’s a lot to soak in this garden to inspire creativity.
Kirstenbosch National Botanical Garden in Cape Town, South Africa, covers 90 acres and is part of an even larger 1,300-acre nature reserve dedicated to South African flora. The garden has been featured in many scientific papers and books and has even helped identify and describe new species.
Founded in 1913, Kirstenbosch is dedicated to the cultivation of indigenous plants and includes a large conservatory and a variety of art exhibitions. In the summer, the garden hosts outdoor concerts and has hosted artists like Michael Bublé. A perfect garden to inspire creativity, it’s become popular for creative minds to connect with its beauty.
The Butchart Gardens is a National Historic Site of Canada located in Brentwood Bay, British Columbia, Canada, near Victoria on Vancouver Island.
The gardens were designed in 1910 by Isaburo Kishida and feature over 900 different plants. It was a passion project of Jennie Butchart, who envisioned a grand garden in the depleted limestone deposits. Over many years the Butchart family added to the garden, adding a Japanese garden, an Italian garden, a rose fountain, a star pond, and many greenhouses and art displays.
Ryōan-ji Garden (Kyoto, Japan)
Ryōan-Ji (竜安寺), which translate to the peaceful dragon temple, is the site of Japan’s most famous zen rock garden. Located in Kyoto, Japan, Ryōan-Ji is a historical monument and UNESCO World Heritage Site and is one of the finest surviving examples of kare-sansui (“dry landscape”).
The temple has served as a mausoleum for several emperors, but there is a controversy over who built the garden and when. Most say it dates back to the 15th century, Hosokawa Katsumoto, the creator of the first temple of Ryōan-Ji. Others say it was built by the famous landscape painter and monk, Sōami. Either way, it’s an inspiring zen garden for creativity where every part of its design is a meditation.
It has inspired many creative minds throughout its history, including composer John Cage, who created a series of auditory and visual artwork based on it.
The Gardens of Versailles is a UNESCO World Heritage site west of the Palace of Versailles in France, covering 800 hectares of land designed by André Le Nôtre, commissioned by Louis XIV in 1661.
Originally a swamp and hunting grounds, it took 40 years to complete and was so ambitious and challenging new technical and scientific solutions emerged from the project. The garden was inspiring creativity before it was even finished.
The gardens are meticulously manicured and feature vast lawns, sculptures, 50 fountains, 200,000 trees, 210,000 flowers planted annually, 5.57 km Grand Canal, hedge mazes, and more.
Majorelle Garden is a two and half acre botanical garden and artist’s landscape garden in Marrakech, Morocco.
Designed by French painter Jacques Majorelle, it took forty years to complete. It features a blue cubist villa designed by the French architect Paul Sinoir. This blue was inspired by the vibrant colors and street life of Marrakech. Jacques Majorelle liked the color so much he patented it as bleu Majorelle before he died.
The gardens and buildings are dedicated to various museums and exhibits. Majorelle’s former studio workshop still features many of his paintings but also hosts the Berber Museum, exhibiting objects of Amazigh (Berber) culture.
Villa d’Este (Tivoli, Italy)
Villa d’Este is a 16th-century villa and Italian Renaissance garden in Tivoli, Italy. It’s been recognized as a UNESCO World Heritage Site as one of the most remarkable and comprehensive illustrations of Renaissance culture.
The garden was commissioned by Cardinal Ippolito II d’Este, who was a lavish patron of the arts, supporting creative minds like the sculptor Benvenuto Cellini, the musician Pierluigi da Palestrina and the poet Torquato Tasso. D’Este commissioned Pirro Ligorio, a prominent Italian architect, painter, antiquarian, and garden designer, to build the villa and garden.
The villa and garden passed through many hands throughout the years and inspired many creative minds, such as the composer Franz Liszt who wrote three pieces that depict the grounds. Jean Garrigue‘s volume of poems A Water Walk by Villa d’Este (1959) was inspired by the gardens. Kenneth Anger filmed Eaux d’Artifice among the water features of the garden. Villa d’Este was painted or drawn by so many Renaissance artists it influenced and was imitated in other gardens across Europe and Russia.
Summer Palace (Beijing, China)
Summer Palace (颐和园) in Beijing, China, is a vast ensemble of lakes, gardens, and palaces dating back to the Qing dynasty. it covers an expanse of 2.9 square kilometers (1.1 sq mi) with many halls and pavilions to lookout on Kunming lake and the surrounding nature.
As part of the UNESCO’s World Heritage List, it’s been called “a masterpiece of Chinese landscape garden design” and features over 3,000 various ancient buildings that house a collection of over 40,000 kinds of valuable historical relics from each dynasty.
Gardens of Bomarzo (Lazio, Italy)
Gardens of Bomarzo, also known as the Sacro Bosco or Park of the Monsters in Lazio, Italy, was commissioned in the 16th century by Pier Francesco Orsini, a patron of the arts and Duke of Bomarzo. He created the garden when his wife died to cope with his grief. The design is attributed to Pirro Ligorio, who also did Villa d’Este, and the sculptures were created by Simone Moschino.
After many years the garden became overgrown and neglected, but when Salvador Dalí made a short movie about the park and completed a painting based on the park, a restoration program was implemented, and now the garden can be visited by tourists.
Exploring the park, you’ll soon realize what drew Dalí to it. The sculptures and garden-style fit a renaissance Mannerist style with arcane symbolism. Other creatives that were inspired by the strange garden include, poet André Pieyre de Mandiargues, poet Jean Cocteau, Argentinian writer Manuel Mujica Láinez, and many more.
Zach is an international writer, photographer, filmmaker, martial artist, and creator of Creative Enso, the Zen art of creative living. His goal is to empower and inspire creatives to live healthier, happier, and more creative lifestyles.
