Personal essay relates how my creative Tokyo neighbors inspire my balcony gardening

中野と新宿の近所の庭について、「The Plant」というスペインの雑誌に記事を書きました。インタビューと記事で、庭を作る個人的な理由を考えます。残念ですが、今のところ、記事は英語だけです。

Around this time last year I worked with film photographer Daisuke Hamada on a long article about flower pot gardens in Tokyo for The Plant, a semi-annual magazine from Spain. The article combines a personal essay about the pleasure of urban gardening and includes two interviews with my Nakano neighbors who have created public beauty with very limited space and budgets.  Some blog readers have asked for a copy, so I am attaching a PDF scan here (3 MB).

Shared Beauty: Tokyo’s Pot Gardens. The Plant, Issue #3. Fall, 2012.

ここの話, Koko no hanashi: Talking about Here

The incredibly prolific, creative, and productive Chris Berthelsen has launched a new public project, called ここの話, Koko no hanashi: Talking about Here. It’s an amazing, low tech and also analog project that creates community dialogue about public, publicly visible, and abandoned urban spaces. He’s prototyped it this week in western Tokyo, and you can read about it online and follow its progress through Twitter and a mailing list.

Talking about Here relies on a simple framework: placing a laminated sign and a simple question, like “Why can’t we use this park at night,” to invite neighbors to discuss very local spaces that are shared, visible, or under-utilized. People can respond using the QR code, or by simply writing in the notebook that is attached to the sign with a pen. Responses will be collated on a stripped down blog specific to each location.

The five initial locations are an interesting mix: a bleak park in front of a factory (run-down, official), a friendly neighborhood park which has been declared a ‘night no-go zone’ (well-kept, official), a park under an elevated freeway (run-down, secluded, official), an abandoned car in an apartment complex parking lot (illegal use), and a deserted house on a school route (run-down, private property).

The prototype just went up this week, and there are many questions: Will the signs be taken down? Will officials contact Chris to question his actions? Will neighbors use the QR code or notebooks to record their feeling and memories? Will neighbors be interested to read what other neighbors record?

I am always amazed at Chris’ imagination and ability to make things happen, with low fidelity tools and a bit of daring. We have worked together in creating the Tokyo DIY Gardening project, including the blog and collaborative mapping workshop last August at 3331 Arts Chiyoda. I believe he’s now got four projects launched in his spare time, all of which are shared freely online.

I have asked Chris if I can participate in Phase 2 of this project. I already have a few places in mind: a beautiful abandoned wood house with a garden that is minimally maintained by a neighbor, a pedestrian path that is heavily used and sitting above an old creek, my neighbors’ fruit trees. It might be interesting to ask property owners if they would like to have a sign that seeks comments about their public gardens. I wonder what the reaction will be?

Urbio 2010 conference in Nagoya

Nagoya will be hosting a conference next May called URBIO 2010, on urban biodiversity and design. The conference precedes October’s 10th Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity (COP 10) which will also be held in Nagoya.

I am excited about the conference’s focus on urban biodiversity. With the world rapidly becoming urban, and Japan leading the way in rural to city migration, cities are becoming key sites for human life and the promotion of biodiversity.

The deadline for suggesting a presentation is December 31, so please sign up now if you want to attend. My understanding is that all presentations will be accepted as the organizers are trying to create an inclusive experience.

Over the past months I have realized that Nagoya is promoting many new urbanism events, including a recent Creative Design City Nagoya conference, which had a keynote by Professor John Wood of Goldsmiths, University of London.

Bento and Japanese Beauty

Today’s New York Times has a great “Room for Debate” feature where four cultural experts discuss the beauty of the Japanese bento box. Although seemingly off-topic from Tokyo Green Space, the discussion expresses relevant cultural aesthetics and the importance of beauty, simplicity, and care.

John Maeda, the president of the Rhode Island School of Design, talks about simplicity and making due in an island nation with limited natural resources. I like his view that Japanese value “making less into more,” and traces bento creation to Kyoto food, a fanciful illusion that masks limited food resources.

Kenya Hara, art director of Muji and professor of Musashino Art University, talks about shokunin kishitsu, or craftsman’s spirit. By cleaning carefully, working diligently, or preparing lunch boxes with creativity, airport cleaners, construction workers and home-makers make the mundane into something beautiful.

I also like how he claims Japanese have a special ability, “an incapacity to see ugliness,” that allows them to ignore urban chaos, ugly architecture and bad signage. In the drabbest office or construction environment, there is still a space to enjoy a perfect bento lunch.

It is easy to see how some of these ideas are expressed in the beautification of public spaces: ordinary people working within the constraints of an often poorly designed urban landscape, creating small vignettes of beauty with a mix of artistry and care, and sharing these creations with minimal self-importance.