Landscape as Spirit: Creating a Contemplative Garden [Hardcover]

Martin Hakubai Mosko (Author), Alxe Noden (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 1, 2003

This beautiful book is a resource for those who want to create a contemplative garden or to better understand what it is to follow a contemplative path. It will be of interest to landscape architects and designers, anyone interested in the fusion of East and West in cultural expression, and garden lovers everywhere. It explores the innovative approach to garden and landscape design found in the work of Martin Mosoko, a landscape architect and Zen teacher working in the Rocky Mountain region of Colorado.

Mosoko's work incorporates principles of Oriental and Western garden design to make bold and original statements in his landscapes. Mosoko explains how to deploy the materials of the garden so that their arrangement reflects the contemplative mind. The chief paradigm he uses is the mandala, a symbolic picture of the ideal world used in some form in many of the world's cultures. Rocks, streams, plants, paths, and structures of the garden each take their place in the mandala as one of its five elements: Earth, Water, Fire, Air, and Space. The means to produce a balance of these elements is the mind conditioned by meditation and a clear understanding of its own nature. Inner harmony is expressed as outer beauty.

Mosoko's approach to landscaping transforms space into spirit, infused with magic. It can be used to create anything from a small courtyard to a country estate, in any environment from the city to the suburbs. After explaining theory and method the book leads us into five of Mosko's gardens, each alive with the energy and excitement he brings to his designs. Although located in different parts of the country and created in different styles, each garden is a reflection of the mind of clarity and calm.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Drawing upon a combination of Occidental and Oriental garden wisdom, Martin perceives the garden as a mandala, and creates meditative spaces where the spirit can play."—Gert Groening, Ph.D., Berlin University of the Arts



"Mosko is a magician whose creations are spaces of great meditative power and innocence. His gardens reassure us that nature and mankind are, perhaps, really one after all."—Panayoti Keliatis, Curator of Plants, Denver Botanical Gardens

From the Publisher

What is a contemplative garden and how do we create one from the ordinary materials of life? That is the central question answered in this book, both in text and in more than 150 full-color photographs. It explores the means by which we can express our inner harmony as outer beauty.

Ordinary landscape design has lost its dimension of magic, and its true connection to the natural world. Based on over 30 years of garden-building experience and decades of spiritual practice, the authors suggest an alternative basis for design. Their paradigm is the mandala, an imagined reality and physical shape that appears in the art and myth of many of the world's cultures

Drawing on both Oriental and western philosophies, the book describes an entirely new way to think about garden design. It leads us into the landscapes designed by Martin Mosko, a Zen priest and landscape architect, worlds of sensual delight that are complete in themselves. Each is filled with the peace and harmony that reflects their integration of the materials used with an exceptional plan.

Whether you have a small urban courtyard or a large yard, the ideas presented here will inspire your heart and imagination. Those who want to take their design talents further will also find a novel way of thinking about space, energy, and the elements.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 176 pages
• Publisher: Weatherhill; First Edition edition (September 1, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0834805383
• ISBN-13: 978-0834805385
• Product Dimensions: 10.3 x 0.9 x 10.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.6 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #177,604 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

45 of 46 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A spiritual and visual delight, November 27, 2003

By 

F. C. Lloyd (New Castle, Colorado United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Landscape as Spirit: Creating a Contemplative Garden (Hardcover)

Mosko is a Zen teacher and Landscape Architect and this book seeks to explain his philosophy by showing and describing how the teachings and practice of both disciplines relate to each other and with the external world.

Most people when they think of Zen and gardens can only think of the immaculate stone and gravel gardens of Japan. Mosko shows that the true understanding of the basic principles of harmony and balance leads to the creation of gardens that delight the eye and the soul.

Taking each element of the garden individually, Mosko explains the spiritual balance between the opposites and the harmony of that balance which, when translated successfully into a real garden, results in an immediate sense of 'rightness' when the garden is experienced. This 'rightness' is beautifully captured by Noden's photographs. The testament to Mosko's brilliance is that the gardens are 'right' for a spectrum of clients not just 'right' for Mosko. The superficial disparity between The Adobe and Flowers in Space lessens the closer you look and you can see the underlying principles of harmony and balance are exactly the same for both.

The beauty of this book for me is that I have found it wildly instructive and inspirational despite having little or no knowledge or understanding of 'Eastern' religion. I found that certain phrases and design concepts would arise in my mind long after I had read the book, infusing me with a desire to express those thoughts in my work.

This book is a must for anyone considering a contemplative garden and a very worthy reference for anyone wanting to design a garden of any sort.

34 of 36 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Landscape as Spirit, December 26, 2003

By 

Hathaway Barry (Pt. Reyes, Ca. United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Landscape as Spirit: Creating a Contemplative Garden (Hardcover)

In this time of shortening days when everything but us hurry up humans is sensibly quieting down, what a pleasure and a treasure to sit down in a comfy armchair and open this book. Turning the pages is stepping into a contemplative garden and wandering the paths. Letting the colors and shapes and scents and sounds take you in. A beauty feast - massaging your worried mind, snatching speedy thought, soothing your bustling spirit.
And when, a timeless while later, you close the book and stand up in your feet again, you are changed.
Restored, refreshed and more in love with life.

How does a book do all this?
I don't know.

That is part of the delightful mystery and what I love about it.

Clearly, these two authors have been having a good time. Working hard, paying attention in their own lives to what it is that creates harmony and balance. Playing with rock, water, plants, and light. Listening deeply to the voices that seem to encourage us to stop arguing with reality and relax back into our natural sanity. Now, with gorgeous photographs and wise words, they are sharing with us what they've discovered along the way.

I suggest "reading" Landscape as Spirit once through just for the images. Turning the pages slowly and letting the gardens enter and speak. Then, a second time, for the words - inspirational and practical, for the professional gardener and layperson alike.

Thank you to Mosko and Norden for what you have given birth to and your generosity of spirit in offering it out into the world.

22 of 24 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Extraordinary insights, October 18, 2004

By 

G. E. Kidder Smith Jr. "Professor of Asian St... (Brunswick, Maine) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Landscape as Spirit: Creating a Contemplative Garden (Hardcover)

This book is remarkable in at least three regards. First, it is so finely produced that we, as readers, can actually feel our way into the gardens it is showing us. Second, the principles of garden-making it offers us are profound, simple and flexible: we can see how the Mosko gardens emerge from them, and how our own might too. Third, and most unusual, it is deeply spiritual, coming from years of meditative practice in the Zen and Tibetan tradtions, as well as in unnamed native traditions of spirit. In the deepest sense this book is beauty as instruction.