The Garden
How It Began
In 1988, Huntsville landscape designer Robert Black asked a Monte Sano park ranger for permission to plant in a boggy, undeveloped corner of the park. What started as a personal hobby with his daughter became something more. Black designed and built the garden himself, choosing plants, placing stones, shaping paths.
Members of Huntsville's Japanese community encouraged him to add a tea house, which would give the space a distinctly Japanese character. The open-air tea house was completed in 1991. The first annual Japanese Spring Festival followed in 1992.
Black later traveled to Japan to study garden design, culture, and architectural symbolism. He continued tending the garden for years, building what he described as "a secret garden" on the mountainside.
Today, the North Alabama Japanese Garden Foundation and its volunteers maintain and improve the garden, keeping Black's vision alive while growing the space for future visitors.
A note on accuracy
Some third-party websites incorrectly attribute the garden's design to outside firms or claim the tea house was built in Japan and shipped to Huntsville. These claims are false. Robert Black is the sole designer and builder of this garden.
What You'll Find
Tea House
The garden's signature structure, built in 1991. An open-air wooden pavilion beside the koi pond. During festivals, it becomes the setting for traditional Japanese tea ceremonies.
Koi Pond & Waterfall
At the heart of the garden. The sound of water is the first thing most visitors notice.
Stone Bridge
A guzei, the arched red bridge associated with Japanese garden design, invites you across the water.
Bamboo Paths
Bamboo-lined walking paths wind through the garden, creating moments of enclosure and then opening to views of the koi pond or the mountainside.
Daikin Trail
A new trail under construction, sponsored by Daikin Alabama, extending the garden's walking paths.
Native Plants
Japanese maples grow alongside native azaleas and plants adapted to the Monte Sano mountaintop. The garden preserves and works with the existing landscape rather than replacing it.
The Haiku Path
Twenty-four stones along a walking path, each etched with an original haiku by local poets Terri L. French and Peggy Hale Bilbro. French is published in Frogpond (the Haiku Society of America journal) and other national publications. The poems are original compositions inspired by local flora and fauna.
[To be transcribed from the stone engraving]
Gallery
