Kubota Garden

The self-taught Japanese master landscaper Fujitaro Kubota (1879-1973) was a horticultural trailblazer, using time-honoured Japanese techniques while embracing plants and trees native to the Pacific Northwest.

Running a successful gardening business in South Seattle, Kubota developed this exquisite show garden, creating hills, valleys, streams, waterfalls, ponds and rocky outcrops in 20 acres.

The Kubota Garden was a labour of love spanning five decades and purchased by the City of Seattle in 1987. In the 1990s Fujitaro’s son Tom laid out the Stroll Garden here, which has a reflecting pond hemmed by lanterns and carefully pruned pines and maples.

There are more than 220 Japanese maples in the Kubota Garden, many of which are rare and unusual varieties.