For the first time, a classical Chinese garden is being exhibited at the annual Hampton Court Palace Flower Show, the world's largest horticultural exhibition, which runs from July 5 to 10. While the exhibition continues, the judging is over the Chinese garden took out the silver medal.
Hosted by the Royal Horticultural Society (RHS), the UK's leading gardening charity, the show is held every year in Surrey, 20 minutes by train from London, and features a range of flowers, plants and themed gardens, most of which are from Britain.
From humble beginnings in 1990, the exhibition has drawn around 185,000 visitors this year, including the royal family and many other celebrities.
The original idea of bringing a Chinese classical garden to the show was Selina Zheng's, a Chinese-Briton who was born in Beijing, studied Ikebana (Japanese flower arrangement) in Tokyo and later settled down in the UK.
"I have visited this flower show for many years and always felt it was a pity that no Chinese gardens had ever been exhibited," Zheng said.
Out of a passion for flowers and Chinese horticulture, an idea began forming in Zheng's mind after last year's exhibition to exhibit a Chinese garden. The year-long journey to bring a bit of China to Britain had begun she had to apply to the RHS first, then find a designer, sponsor and producer, and do all the coordinating in her spare time.
"A show garden is the symbol of a beautiful dream," she said, "through my personal passion and one year's voluntary work for this garden, I am offering you my hope for beautiful dreams."
Story of eternal lovers
The classical Chinese garden Zheng and her colleagues brought to Britain introduced people to China's Romeo and Juliet.
The story tells of a tragedy that took place in the East Jin Dynasty (AD 317-420). A girl named Zhu Yingtai disguised herself as a boy in order to become a scholar. She meets another scholar Liang Shanbo and falls in love. Unfortunately they can't get married because Zhu's parents have agreed to a proposal of marriage from a local wealthy family. The story ends in the tragedy of death but the lovers are reborn and become butterflies.
The garden followed the six parts of the story: "Meeting on the bridge of weeds," "Becoming sworn brothers under a willow," "Studying in the same school for three years," "Saying 18 goodbyes on the way back," "Separation in the Long Pavilion" and "Changing into butterflies."
Basic features of the garden
"I have tried hard to integrate almost every basic feature of a classical Chinese garden into my design," said Liu Tingfeng, associate professor of horticulture with Tianjin University and designer of the project.
Classical Chinese gardens embody traditional philosophy and culture in an indirect way through buildings, stones, water and plants, Liu explained, while Western gardens pay more attention to the direct visual effect.
"I made four amendments," he said. Liu changed his original design of a high wall into a bamboo fence to enclose the garden. "The first design was in typical Ming and Qing dynasty (1368-1911) style, which represents the highest level of Chinese classical gardening culture, displaying exquisite detail," he said. "The final design is more of the Wei and Jin dynasties (AD 220-420), which emphasize primitiveness and simplicity."
Liu's garden has one window on the solid wall to the left of the entrance to the garden and one gate, which frames the Liang stone and Zhu reef (two stones which symbolize the two main characters of the love story).
He used a lot of stones in his garden, which represent mountains in classical Chinese gardens. Chinese people believe mountains symbolize mercy and generosity. Water in a classical Chinese garden represents wisdom and intelligence. Liu's garden has a pond, which is separated by a bridge into two areas, one large, one small.
The gazebo and pavilion are typical structures found in such a garden, and Liu's has an eye-catching hexagon-shaped gazebo, which is the exhibit's focal point.
A classical Chinese garden always has paved patterns, made by bricks and tiles. The patterns are of flowers, animals and Chinese calligraphy, among others. Liu's garden has two: the first is a pair of butterflies at the entrance to start the love story and the second is a Chinese knot at the exit, tied by a long string of thread a symbol of eternity.
Liu used Chinese calligraphy on the frame of the door and pillars of the gazebo, whose meaning matches the garden's theme. Of course, visitors have no idea of their meaning, but can appreciate their artistic shape nonetheless. Chinese use plants to convey meaning, a fact not forgotten by Liu in his design. For example, bamboo represents the integrity of scholars.
Banana trees, on the other hand, are often planted outside a window, which sits above a table on the inside. When it rains, you can hear the rain drops on the big leaves of the banana tree, which is believed will give you inspiration when writing a poem.
To coincide with the theme, Liu's garden has pine, plum, willow, banana, phoenix and laurel trees as well as bamboo, rose, azalea, and lotus flowers, which are symbols of love, eternity, holiness and purity.
"Although we got a silver medal we are not very happy. We wanted the gold," said the ambitious Zheng.
(China Daily July 8, 2005)
