A teahouse named Niko-An is rebuilt beside a pond of a Japanese garden which was created 80 years ago in Pasadena’s historical residential area. (Courtesy of the Storrier Stearns Japanese Garden)

Celebrate the Year of the Rat at the Storrier Stearns Japanese Garden

On Sunday February 9, from 12pm to 4pm, the Storrier Stearns Japanese Garden will hold its annual East Asian celebration of the Lunar New Year, offering a chance to enjoy arts and craft making, art demonstrations and musical performances from Japan, China and Korea.

Partnering with Cultural News newspaper, the Garden will present a very special performance of traditional Japanese Minyo (“Folk Music”) with Mme. Matsutoyo Sato, Matsutoyo Sakura and Lunar New Year on vocals and shamisen. Musical performances will be held in the garden’s Niko-an Teahouse (weather permitting) and will be at 12:30pm and 2pm.

Visitors will also be able to try their hand at traditional Korean Minhwa Folk Painting with representatives from the Korean Cultural Center. Each visitor will be able to take home their own hand-painted souvenir! We will also be presenting demonstrations of Chinese and Japanese flower arranging, featuring arrangements created especially for the Lunar New Year.

The new exhibition Shizen: Depictions of Nature in Japanese Art, featuring Japanese prints, paintings and other art works inspired by the natural world, will be on view in the garden’s En Gallery, and the gift store Takara-ten will be open for business with an assortment of wonderful Japanese art works and gifts.

The Storrier Stearns Japanese Garden was created by Japanese immigrant Kinzuchi Fujii from 1935 to 1942 as a private garden for his patrons, Charles and Ellamae Storrier Stearns.

Fujii designed and built Japanese landscapes across Southern California in the first half of the 20th century, and this is his only remaining garden.

He also considered it his very best work. The only stand-alone Japanese garden in the San Gabriel Valley and a fine example of the hill-and-pond-style kaiyu-shiki-teien, or “stroll garden” (a garden type that first appeared in the 17th century on the estates of Japan’s or military lords), the Storrier Stearns Japanese Garden is now listed in the National Register of Historic Places, designated a California Historical Landmark and operates as a non-profit cultural and educational organization.

For more information about the Storrier Stearns Japanese Garden and to rsvp for this festival, please visit the garden’s website: www.japanesegardenpasadena.com.