The Garden of Reflections
Nice to meet you, I'm Konishi, a staff member.
It was exactly this time last year that I joined Utsushiki and have had a very grateful first year, filled with new encounters and inspiration.
Through the visitors, I have been able to experience a time of reflection that I was unaware of.
As the new year begins, we feel renewed and hope to continue to spend precious time together with you all.
At Utsushiki, I am mainly in charge of the garden.
I used to work at a flower shop for about ten years and spent every day with plants.
For first-time visitors, it may be a little difficult to find the location of Utsushiki,
Once you find the entrance sign and step inside, you'll be greeted by a garden.
As the seasons change, so do the weather and humidity of the day.
Plants also sense the same things that we touch on our skin and change from moment to moment.
I first became interested in plants when I was in high school.
One very short chapter I found in a classical textbook made a big impression on me and has stayed in my mind ever since.
It was a chapter titled "The Changing Chrysanthemums" taken from the diary of a female writer from the Heian period.
Below is a summary.
She was a very attractive woman and was being courted by a man.
She ignored him for a long time and turned her back on him, but after a long time she finally accepted him.
Suddenly the man has a change of heart and falls in love with the younger woman.
I'm going to send a letter to that guy.
A single decaying chrysanthemum is added.
The feelings he puts into the chrysanthemums represent his changing heart,
He saw himself as a chrysanthemum, a flower that was considered the most noble and beautiful of the time and that had lost its freshness and been transformed by time.
The art of expression to convey the feelings of the time,
I was deeply attracted to the way that the presence of a single plant can be shaped by a person's imagination and feelings.
I feel like there's something deeper going on than just being beautiful or smelling good. 
A decaying and fallen dahlia of the Asteraceae family.
Flower shops usually only display flowers when they are at their most beautiful stage, when they are about to bloom.
For example, I couldn't know that tulips produce seeds until I actually grew them, watched them closely, and tried them out.
Utsushiki is filled with many items that have been collected from people who have spent time together in various places.
The plants in the garden, some of whom have been here longer than the current owners,
They have accumulated time that we do not know, and now they are spending it with us.
I would like to write mainly about the plants in Utsushiki Garden, which is a mixture of old plants and newly planted ones.
If you stop to look out over the garden on your way to the gallery or coffee shop, you will see a view that can only be seen at that moment.
The plants you see may change from time to time.
I hope you enjoy that too.
Konishi Saori
