Customer Reviews

Zen Rock Gardening

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I got this as a gift for Christmas, and I was really excited because I love Zen gardens, but garden provided is so poor and sad. The little garden has a stapled on cardboard bottom that the sand leaks out of, and the rake was falling apart. Yes I know that the Buddha is everywhere, and he does not need anything more than what was provided, but I had this at work. It stinks to keep having to clean up sand every morning.

The book was wonderful, and I keep it at work to read when things get stressful, but I'm going to go buy my own stuff to make a real, durable Zen Garden.

If the Zen Gardening Book part of this book/kit combination makes it into your local library, check out a copy and bask in the meditations, creativity and musings of the author. The kit is uninspiring and actually degrades the lofty consciousness inspired by the book. Use your imagination, save the bucks, and create your own Zen garden using sand and rocks and wood that speak to you.

This kit sells for $30 if you buy it brand new at a store. It's not worth it at that price. I got mine for about $7 at an auction, and I'm happy with the expense.

Previous reviews are right: the box has a cardboard base and the sand, because it's so fine, would leak out of it. What I did before I used it was run glue all along the inner and outer edges of the box to seal the gaps. It doesn't leak anymore :-).

I have mixed feelings about Zen Rock Gardening by Abd Al-Hayy Moore. First, I adore Zen rock gardens. I have a mini garden on my desk that I love looking at and raking. I really enjoy going to locations that have a Zen rock garden and just sitting by it. To me there is great peace and beauty in this style of garden.

This book has numerous lovely photos of rock gardens, and describes the history and meaning behind them. It talks about styles of gardens and how they changed over the centuries. I find all of this quite fascinating.

But that being said, the layout of the book makes it hard to read and use. I imagine they were trying to be "artsy" or "zen" with this book - but I have *many* books on Zen and those are arranged so you can read them :). In this case they used a tall, narrow stripe of area for the text, and a large font, meaning you get maybe 3 or 4 words on a line before you go down to the next line. Imagine reading a book where you had to read:

This is the first
line and then
this is the
second line and
this is the
third line

You can see how that would get to you pretty quickly! The entire book is strung together like that. If you want to go back to find ideas on rock placement, or on raking patterns, you can't. Everything is sort of jumbled together in the middle, and you have to read that three-words-at-a-time layout to track down an idea or two.

Also, while I do enjoy the photos, they are often small and very murky. This would have done MUCH better to have large size, clear, color photos to get ideas from and to understand what professionally done gardens look like in various parts of the world.

A great start - but I think if it was laid out better, with better photos, that it could be much more helpful and enjoyable to read. As it is now it's more of a "poem" celebrating rock gardens than a book of use either to someone who loves or who wants to create one.

The Zen box and sand are exactly as pictured BUT the ROCKS you actually get are NOT! I recieved over 16'ish bits of minature rocks. NOT THE KIND OF ROCKS you would use in a Zen garden. Typically, you get 6-8 rocks MAX and the rocks are of small, mid to large size so you can get creative with less pieces; and do so with interesting rock formations NOT bits and pieces. Pieces so small they were hidden under the sand. If you made the mistake and purchased this kit, you can always toss the rocks and go out and find/buy more appropriate ones. Mine has been on the shelf collecting dust until time presents itself so I can go out on a rock hunt!

Many years ago I purchased this item for my wife as a joke since she works for two CPA's. However, the joke was on me as I became engrossed with this product. It is amazing how much clutter one removes from one's mind once you begin to create the infinite number of patterns presented by the Zen Gardening Kit. It almost got to the point of ripping up my backyard and installing a full-fledged Zen Garden.