First e-Book About the Japanese Garden Funda-in, a Small Zen Temple in the Tofuku-Ji Temple Complex in Kyoto Released by Real Japanese Gardens

Kyoto, Japan, June 21, 2013 --(PR.com)-- On June 13th, the Japanese garden design team Keizo Hayano and Jenny Feuerpeil have released a digital book about the Zen temple garden Funda-in, which is also known as Sesshu-ji, a subtemple of the Tofukuji complex in Kyoto. To promote Japanese garden culture in the world, the design duo publishes artisanal books on their website “Real Japanese Gardens” (www.japanesegardens.jp), that highlight not only the beauty of Japanese gardens with impressive photographs, but also focus on Japanese architecture and the history and philosophy behind each garden.

Funda-in, a small and quiet Zen temple in southern Kyoto, belongs to the favorite gardens of the Japanese garden designers Keizo Hayano and Jenny Feuerpeil. “The karesansui garden of Funda-in temple is one of Kyoto’s true secret gardens!” says Japanese garden writer Jenny Feuerpeil. “When I visited the beautiful gardens of Tofukuji in autumn 2012, I immediately fell in love with the calm, relaxing atmosphere of the Zen temple. The garden and architecture form a marvelous symbiosis. The Japanese design concepts of Framing the View and Borrowed Scenery have been employed by the old garden master Sesshu and modern re-constructor Shigemori to utmost perfection. Too bad most visitors of the Tofuku-ji temple complex just walk past it – we want to change that with our garden e-book!”

“It is our goal to show our readers the secret Japanese gardens, the hidden gems in the bustling streets of Tokyo and Kyoto” says 40 year old Tokyo based garden designer Keizo Hayano. “Funda-in is such a garden – small in size, yet beautiful in its proportions and very quiet, even on the weekends. While most tourists visit Tofuku-ji’s Hojo, Kaisan-do or other temples like Ryogin-an and Komyo-ji, Fundain is often over-looked. With our platform, we would like to give foreign tourist also the opportunity to explore these lesser known beautiful gardens of Japan.”

The e-book titled “Funda-in, sub-temple of Tofuku-ji” has 14 pages and 44 quality pictures of the historically important temple and garden. It introduces the Shoin architecture of the temple, the front garden, south garden and the tea house Tonan-tei and its adjacent tea garden (east garden), which was designed by Shigemori Mirei.

The e-book is the first world-wide to be written and published about the Funda-in temple gardens.

Note to editors:
Currently the website www.japanesegardens.jp features basic information, pictures and directions to around 90 gardens in Japan. To date, 13 eBooks about famous, secret and private Japanese gardens have been published. Another 3 eBooks have been released about typical elements of a Japanese garden – traditional fences and gravel patterns. 2 more e-books about Japanese moss and Japanese bamboo have been published in the plant category.

Providing reliable information to their readers is Real Japanese Gardens’ highest priority. Before writing an e-book, the team visits the garden and takes photos of the garden and its features. Up to 80% of the research is done using Japanese resources (books, journals and interviews) to stay as close to the Japanese garden tradition as possible.

Keizo Hayano is the owner and head designer of the Japan garden design studio Niwashyu in Shibuya, Tokyo (www.niwashyu.jp). He studied the fine arts at the Kyoto City College of Arts and loves small intimate Kyoto gardens that soothe the soul. Member of the Japanese Association of Garden Designers.

San Francisco based garden designer Jenny Feuerpeil came to Japan after leaving her job at a global IT company. From 2008 on, she studied garden design in Chelsea, London and founded the garden design label Dendron Exterior Design (www.dendronexteriordesign.com). In 2010, she decided to go to Japan to learn the Japanese garden tradition first hand as an apprentice in a garden maintenance company near Tokyo. She loves the rough texture of natural materials, the boldness of stone arrangements and karesansui gardens.