Guerilla Flowerpots in Tokyo’s Public Spaces

Tokyo is not known for its greener pastures but for hypermodern architecture and a cityscape that looks like a future preconceived in the early 80s. “Wow! Amazing!” is how tourists usually react. But how do people actually live in this concrete urbanity? Given the lack of vast green spaces, Tokyoites are taking action: First, reclaim your immediate environment and stuff the sidewalk with flower pots as much as possible. Second, on the official side, imitate nature to soothe the stressed commuters with a forest of plastic plants, cement trees - or the friendly chirping of an artificial bird. PingMag shows you the green islands and blossoming places in this most dense populated area.

Written by Michael Mahoney
Photos by Michael and Verena

In a recent Monocle (Vol 01, issue 05,) it was revealed that only 4 percent of Tokyo’s urban landmass is allocated for green space - compared to 12 percent in New York! So in 2000, the metropolitan government laid out The Green Tokyo Plan and showed that cities like New York, but also Vancouver or London have circa 26 to 29 square metres of green spaces per capita - compared to 5 square metres in Tokyo (the plan is now aiming for 7 square metres by 2015.) How come?

Construction? All I see is a lovely little plant…

We are trying to sum up some basic facts about Tokyo’s growth as urban organism as explained in The Transformation of Tokyo during the 1950s and early 1960s paper by Raffaele Pernice of Waseda: The destruction during the Pacific War until 1945 caused a vast housing shortage. Due to the limited materials and strict control by the American occupation, construction was rather limited. As a result, people started building their own wooden shelters that spread and thus mimicked the pre-war, mosaic structure. Later, from the end of the 1950s, the construction industry became one of the main industries and the rapid economic growth led to the following:

“The typical characteristic of modern Japanese cities, most evident in Tokyo, is a chaotic, patchwork-like, urban environment filled with high-density residential and commercial areas close to industrial plants. Few green areas, and a serious shortage of fundamental services such as sewerage and water supply, was indeed the consequence of the combined actions of fast urban growth and limited planning development.” (p. 255)

In another paper, Subcentres and Satellite Cities: Tokyo’s 20th Century Experience of Planned Polycentrism, Andre Sorensen points out that there was indeed a plan for a greenbelt in the late 50s. However, it “was overwhelmed by a combination of greater than expected economic and metropolitan growth, and active local opposition to its implementation.”

A row of green brightens up the gray curb off Omotesando.

In the time of rapid development, it was the citizens of Tokyo themselves who favored unbridled urban expansion over preservation. Local governments embraced growth policies, while landowners within the greenbelt regions partitioned their land and sold it to developers.
Since no laws were enacted to preserve the green spaces, the land was gradually filled in and, as the few rural spaces within the Tokyo area were rezoned for development, the city expanded ever onwards…

Well, let’s see what creative citizens are doing to bring back some of the green:

1. Greener Pastures For The Tiniest Spaces

There simply is no space left free in this sprawl that consist of thousands of villages. Seriously! Every square inch is taken up already – by a street, a building; by a sickly city tree rooted in concrete; or, of course, by the inhabitants. The so the common American ‘front yard’ doesn’t exist: Due to the traditional construction ways, houses are set flush against the street or sidewalk, leaving only tiny concrete embankments for people to use as yard.

Yet homeowners and shopkeepers here have an amazing amount of ingenuity in greening up these tiny grey spaces that remain! Curbs bordering the street become homes for geraniums; A/C units become perfect platforms for potted trees - there are no limitations. And it is quite charming to see how cleverly space are reclaimed!

One man’s fire extinguisher, another man’s gardening plot…

Hard to tell if this one is real or not…

Flowerpot Gardens

With no grassy spaces to use as gardens, Tokyoites often decorate their doorways, stoops and walkways with loads upon loads of flowerpots. Here are what we’ll call flowerpot gardens.

Notably in the older sections of, for example, Asakusa and Ueno, many homeowners use three-tiered, bleacher-like stands to make multi-storey flowerpot gardens, echoing Tokyo’s multistorey lifestyle (left):

A multi-storey flowerpot garden in Asakusa - the bottles are to keep cats from snacking on it.

Bakery shop front spiced up with birdhouse and gnome!

Pictured above on the right: This adorable little French bakery in Tawaramachi really went all out! Cute flowers, a trellis … even a little birdhouse and gnome! The owners here really are trying to make this into a garden…

Expanding beyond doorway yards and shop fronts, these flowerpots are placed in spaces you’d never imagined before: pots as decor of parking lot curbs, boarded-up basement windows or even construction sites?!

Roadside Jungles

Much of Tokyo’s 4 percent green space seems to be broken up into tiny bits and pieces, scattered along the streets. Seemingly, this gives just enough space for city planners to drop some sickly trees here and there. However, in the bits of soil that remain, creative Tokyoites have speedingly managed to make even more green spaces for themselves:

The same jungle, as seen from the side.

In case you’re wondering why people bother putting potted plants in such tiny spaces, we asked around:

“To be closer to nature – because otherwise you won’t get any”, says Mizuho, a resident of Asakusa.

“Because we love green… to make things look prettier!” says Chiemi, of Tokyo’s Setagaya ward.

“Because they don’t have any gardens! Tokyo used to be full of rice fields but they’ve gradually disappeared”, says Tom, of Meguro ward.

Also, if you aren’t familiar with Japan, you might surely wonder how can such precious little green spaces exist in such a big city, without vandalism or other disturbance?

Bring back the birds…

…in crowded Daiakanyama.

One possible reason might be what ethnographies describe as the respect Japanese have for public and private space. To generalise a bit: Everyone plays a part in keeping spaces nice, tidy and orderly for everyone else in ‘the group.’ This possibly also explains all those times we see strangers picking up other people’s rubbish in the streets. As such, (hopefully every) Japanese person would not think of littering or destroying a tiny flowerpot garden since, as a part of a shared common space, it is to be respected.

2. Imitating Nature: Bring Wild Life Into Urbanity

At times and places where real greenery can’t be implimented, Tokyo does its best to recreate it: Plastic plants, plastic trees - even fake animals, often in the unlikeliest of places, attempt to bring a bit of the outdoors back to the urban jungle. Do they succeed?

Tree Trunks As Lampposts

It really does look more or less like a real tree – doesn’t it?

Until you look up and you see a lamp where the leaves and branches should be.

Birds Chirping At Train Stations (and at other places)

While waiting for the Hibiya Line train to arrive at Roppongi Station, you get enchanted by the sweet song of some unknown songbird, whether day or night. Suddenly you realise that it’s been thirty minutes and the bird is still singing the same song. Either the poor thing has gotten into the Red Bull, or you have been fooled by what we call a robo-bird – a tape recording of birds chirping, which are played at various outdoor stations in Tokyo’s train network.

Now that we’ve given you a rough education in some of the best of real and fake nature in Tokyo, let’s take a quiz:

Picturesque ivy dangling from this vending machine…

Looking to bring some nature back to a vending machine, this parking lot owner added some green to his Coke machine.
Fake or real plant?

[It's real!]

Special thanks go out to the inhabitants of Tokyo who, whether natural or not-so-natural, are doing a great job beautifying our space, little by little…

51 Comments

1. Nice little report. I think that putting the flowers outside came from a lack of space and or light inside. Most houses are dark inside and the plants need less looking after outside. The containers too are interesting - old polystyrene fish boxes etc, These have be replaced more recently by the 100 yen pots. Perhaps all these planted pots on walls and around the feet gave the inspration to architects to build walls of plant matter that seem so popular these days?

   Posted by: pbtyo on January 10th, 2008 at 8:00 pm

2. This reminds me of this house i saw in north east tokyo (minami senju) that was completely covered in green :)
   http://laserpanda.com/japan/_DSC0012.JPG

   Posted by: gnilsson on January 10th, 2008 at 8:21 pm

3. Nice, I did notice the very same thing in Tokyo!

   Posted by: japan photos on January 10th, 2008 at 8:57 pm

4. The thought of making the streets green is great! But the way they done it is not too great - a jungle would ruin the urban view

   Posted by: Arman on January 10th, 2008 at 10:56 pm

5. I love these, they certainly work to make the sites a lot more liveable!

   Posted by: Rence on January 11th, 2008 at 12:11 am

6. good idea)

   Posted by: ANdrey SHCH on January 11th, 2008 at 1:27 am

7. I love that pic of the plants in front of the house, so many that pedestrians have to walk in the street.
   Sometimes you can have too much of a good thing.

   Posted by: Charles on January 11th, 2008 at 1:48 am

8. i wanted to do something like this! - Guerilla Gardening!! - anyone in the Wales or London area let’s team up!

   Posted by: yoyopo on January 11th, 2008 at 2:12 am

9. One of the first things I noticed when I first went to live in Japan were these “guerilla flowerpots.” It was one of the tiny details about Japan I love and miss so much! Nice to know other people think these are great, too!

   Posted by: ellydishes on January 11th, 2008 at 3:35 am

10. What a great and lively mess! I would gladly contribute with plants from my dark apartment in Warsaw.

    Posted by: otakugirl on January 11th, 2008 at 4:48 am

11. Great! I’d love to do some guerilla gardening here too! But unfortunately it wouldn’t last for long in german cities because nobody cares about other people’s interests/arts/joy…
    Nevertheless i’ll try to plant something near the streetcar rail this summer…or on top of the … or right in front of the parking gap…

    Posted by: Jan on January 11th, 2008 at 4:50 am

12. When I lived in Tokyo, I did notice the same thing. In fact, my dorm mother had her own collection of potted plants which sat outside of our concrete dormitory. Every morning she would water them and it was her own little “green” amongst the “grey” My dorm mother was so intent on bringing green back, that she had the dormitory painted this awkward neon sea foam green.

    I have photos somewhere… I should dig them up.

    Posted by: Stereo on January 11th, 2008 at 5:17 am

13. It’s pretty much like this, here in São Paulo.
    But I think we got more trees.

    Posted by: Akai on January 11th, 2008 at 5:54 am

14. Many of the things we Westerners initially think are “absent” from Japan are actually present — just at a scale we don’t expect.

    For instance, “God” as we conceive him seems to be absent, but there’s a micro-spirituality scattered through all sorts of everyday activities — wrapping a gift, serving tea.

    “Parks” as we know them may be scarce, but shift scale and you find millions of micro-parks, each the size of a pot. There’s a lot to be said for small-scale (but very widespread) diffusion.

    Posted by: Momus on January 11th, 2008 at 8:21 am

15. Tree trunks as lampposts? What a sick idea to fool people!

    Posted by: Marek S on January 11th, 2008 at 10:54 am

16. Nice report, greenness is definitely something that matters for me and will matter for more and more people. Tiny bits of green as shown here are very nice but Tokyo will probably need a “green lung” in the future, a Central Park-like but with a Japanese touch, would be awesome!

    Posted by: Robin P. on January 11th, 2008 at 2:28 pm

17. This is a great story, I’ve been longing to hear about guerrilla gardening in Japan. I’ve posted a link to the story in the community section of my website http://www.guerrillagardening.org.
    There’s plenty of stuff going on in other places too - Berlin, London, Miami, Toronto, New York etc

    Posted by: Richard R on January 11th, 2008 at 6:18 pm

18. beautiful idea! :)

    Posted by: Maria E. on January 11th, 2008 at 9:15 pm

19. this article is truly awesome, i like the way the put the lamp thing, damn creativeeee..

    Posted by: plue on January 11th, 2008 at 10:35 pm

20. You asked ‘how come?’ I assume this question was in reference to how little greenry there is in Tokyo and indeed most Japanese cities. The answer is poor urban planning. I’ve lived here a decade, and many times you could have fooled me into thinking Japan was a third world nation.

    Posted by: Made in DNA on January 12th, 2008 at 1:59 am

21. word yoyopo lets do it. lets photosynthesize this LDN joynt!

    Posted by: digs86 on January 12th, 2008 at 4:25 am

22. I love the surprises round the corners and bikes…. Indeed there is pure urban planning, yet if one looks hard enough they find Todoroki, in central Tokyo which is the most wonderful green space that is a gorge valley, with huge trees and secret shrines, and volcanic rocks.

    Posted by: ANNA ANTONIADES on January 12th, 2008 at 6:11 pm

23. [...] Guerilla Flowerpots in Tokyo’s Public Spaces » PingMag - The Tokyo-based magazine about “Design… wow, that’s great to see (tags: gardening japan) [...]

    Posted by: M1K3¥’s b-log » Blog Archive » links for 2008-01-12 on January 12th, 2008 at 6:33 pm

24. There is also the growing trend of roof gardens, which franky, are much prettier to look at.

    Posted by: Flea on January 13th, 2008 at 8:38 pm

25. This is great! Just yesterday I was talking about why not give “A garden” as a gift!!! Just plant some flowers or cactus and give a great garden to friends!

    P.S. Roof Gardens are also cool!

    Posted by: nororu on January 14th, 2008 at 12:42 pm

26. [...] Vía Pingmag.jp [...]

    Posted by: Elisava Escuela Superior de Diseño - Postgrado en Diseño y Dirección de Arte » Guerilla Flowerpots in Tokyo’s Public Spaces on January 14th, 2008 at 10:18 pm

27. Makes you thankful to have so much greenery in London. Even in the most urban areas there is still more trees and parks than in Tokyo.

    Posted by: MiNGLED on January 15th, 2008 at 8:43 am

28. When I was visiting my son in Tokyo last May, I noted all of the potted plants in various places all over the city. They were lovely, and I copied the idea when I came back home to Maine. It’s a lot of fun!

    Posted by: Sally on January 15th, 2008 at 9:32 pm

29. [...] at PingMag, a website that bills itself as “an online design magazine based in Tokyo,” you can find some really neat photos and videos about what Tokyo’s residents are [...]

    Posted by: THE CITY FIX: Exploring Sustainable Solutions To The Problems of Urban Mobility » Blog Archive » Tokyo’s Concrete Jungle Gets A Little Greener on January 16th, 2008 at 2:16 am

30. [...] must head over to Ping Magazine and take a look at this photo-essay on Guerilla Greening in Tokyo. With only 4% of the city allocated for green space and no yards to speak of, residents have found [...]

    Posted by: You Grow Girl™ - » Tokyo Gardening: Making Gardens with No Space on January 17th, 2008 at 3:53 am

31. [...] doors open directly into the street, with no semblance of a yard or garden to speak of. But PingMag is reporting that enterprising Japanese are getting around such niggling logistical problems with the result [...]

    Posted by: Going Green with a Vengeance in Tokyo on January 17th, 2008 at 5:39 am

32. There’s a little cafe in Komizawadaigaku, called appropriately Cafe Grass, whose sign has a plastic tree growing out of it. When you pass by you can hear crickets chirruping - they pump out the noise during opening hours. It’s really charming inside too.

    Posted by: Felicity on January 17th, 2008 at 12:06 pm

33. [...] magazine japonais le plus influent en parlait il y a peu de temps : c’est la révolution des fleurs à [...]

    Posted by: street©ulture : Blog Archive : Guerilla flowerpots in Tokyo on January 17th, 2008 at 6:36 pm

34. I like the flower pot ideas, i mean, as a commoner of the general public, there’s only this much you can do to green up the surrounding spaces and i’m sure they are trying and coming up with ideas as hard as possible to make up the damage they have done to the living environment in the past.

    however, personally i don’t quite agree with the fake “re-naturalization” such as fake tree as lamp posts and fake bird singings…just PLAIN sad.

    Posted by: Anonymous on January 18th, 2008 at 1:24 am

35. I like the flower pot ideas, i mean, as a commoner of the general public, there’s only this much you can do to green up the surrounding spaces and i’m sure they are trying and coming up with ideas as hard as possible to make up the damage they have done to the living environment in the past.

    however, personally i don’t quite agree with the fake “re-naturalization” such as fake tree as lamp posts and fake bird singings…just PLAIN sad.

    Posted by: mariya marie on January 18th, 2008 at 1:25 am

36. This is a nice article but it totally lacks in the real fact and data. Actually Tokyo City is not that bad at all. It has more green than New York City.
    The tree cover percentage of Tokyo City is 28.6% and 66.9% as the whole of Tokyo excluding all the islands. The data is available from Tokyo Bureau of Environment. (http://www.kankyo.metro.tokyo.jp/)
    New York City’s tree cover percentage is 24%.

    There are many pictures of the nature in Tokyo on a flickr group called Nature in Tokyo.
    http://www.flickr.com/groups/natureintokyo/pool/

    Posted by: TokyoVerde on January 18th, 2008 at 3:35 pm

37. [...] Para aumentar essa taxa o governo lançou uma ação que incentiva os cidadãos a plantar. A solução de utilizar pequenos espaços me lembra aquela fábula da formiginha apagando o incêndio na floresta. O importante é: se cada um fizer sua parte acho que poderíamos ter um ambiente mais limpo e arborizado. Vejas as fotos. [...]

    Posted by: Espaços urbanos verdes em Tokyo « Tarja Verde on January 18th, 2008 at 10:38 pm

38. [...] out PingMag for more neat [...]

    Posted by: Arctic Oak » Blog Archive » Toyko: Guerrila Flowerpots Reclaim Public Spaces on January 28th, 2008 at 5:40 am

39. I love the picture in Tawaramachi! How many nice plants on dusty little street, just amazing!

    Posted by: Mika on January 29th, 2008 at 4:32 am

40. I used the example of Tokyo in my book “Guerrilla Gardening: A Manualfesto” for people who might ask…”What do I do if my city is already developed?”

    Posted by: David on January 29th, 2008 at 4:48 am

41. Wow, with Japan’s great gardening culture, I didn’t realize there was such little space to actually garden–the gardening spirit is strong.

    Posted by: Heirloom Gardener on January 31st, 2008 at 12:46 pm

42. I love the roadside jungles! :-x

    Posted by: David Barrie on February 2nd, 2008 at 4:09 am

43. [...] concepts” I am working on a project that addresses the dwindling green space in Tokyo. Pingmag ran an article back in January that sparked my interest in the [...]

    Posted by: THMCHNDSTRCT » tree restaurant on February 24th, 2008 at 2:01 am

44. [...] Guerilla Flowerpots in Tokyo’s Public Spaces [...]

    Posted by: Au Japon, c’est la guérilla flowerpot! « Inventeurs’s Weblog on March 12th, 2008 at 12:15 am

45. [...] ← Jeff Staple Talks About Developing Shoes For Nike Considered nj3cter -… optischer April Urban ranks in Harajuku April 21st, 2008 / 0 Comments / [...]

    Posted by: now » optischer April Urban ranks in Harajuku on April 21st, 2008 at 7:43 am

46. [...] Guerilla Flowerpots in Tokyo’s Public Spaces [...]

    Posted by: Blog Les Inventeurs » Archive du blog » Au Japon, c’est la guérilla flowerpot! on April 22nd, 2008 at 1:36 am

47. [...] PingMag shows you the green islands and blossoming places in this most dense populated area. Read it and see more picture here. [...]

    Posted by: green public space in tokyo | [ecosistema urbano] on April 23rd, 2008 at 6:10 pm

48. [...] http://pingmag.jp/2008/01/10/real-vs-fake-nature-in-tokyo/ [...]

    Posted by: Interactie Ontwerpen - Sebastian Hagens » Onderzoek on October 31st, 2008 at 8:49 am

49. [...] that it takes som ingenuity and nerve to nurture green things. Last year Pingmag featured photos of guerilla gardening in Tokyo’s cramped streets. I’ve been guerilla gardening in the side yard of the building, and hoping that the building [...]

    Posted by: Kitchen to garden and back « Chibaraki Life on February 21st, 2009 at 6:52 pm

50. [...] rooftops, in empty lots and along sidewalks, urban communities are becoming increasingly passionate about farming within their own [...]

    Posted by: Growing Our Cities: Urban Agriculture | earth from above on June 5th, 2009 at 4:25 pm

51. There we go, it also adds to public safety:
    http://www.reuters.com/article/oddlyEnoughNews/idUSTRE55B3LC20090612

    Posted by: Verena on June 17th, 2009 at 5:37 pm

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