The garden's origin story reads like a metaphor for Tokyo itself: land conjured from water, then layered with centuries of human ambition. In 1678, Okubo Tadamoto, a member of the Okubo clan and an official of the Tokugawa shogunate, established his residence on this reclaimed ground. Garden designers from the Odawara Domain shaped the landscape into what was then called Rakujuen. At that time, the garden's edge was also Tokyo Bay's edge -- a beach ran along one side, and saltwater fed the central pond. As Tokyo expanded outward over the following centuries, the bay receded. The beach vanished under new construction, the saltwater pond converted to freshwater, and what had been a coastal estate became landlocked. The residence passed through a succession of owners: the Kishu branch of the Tokugawa clan around 1860, the Arisugawa-no-miya imperial family in 1871, and finally the Imperial Household Agency in 1875, which transformed it into the Shiba Detached Imperial Villa.

On September 1, 1923, the Great Kanto earthquake destroyed every building and tree on the property. The fires that swept through Tokyo after the quake left the garden in ruins -- the same fate that struck Kiyosumi Garden across the river. But the garden's bones survived. In January 1924, the site was donated to Tokyo City as part of celebrations anticipating the Showa period of Emperor Hirohito. Rebuilt and opened to the public on April 20, 1924, the garden found new life as a public space. In 1979, the Government of Japan designated it a Place of Scenic Beauty and Special Historic Interest. The one concession to modernity: the garden's northern edge was trimmed to make room for railway tracks, shrinking the grounds from their original extent to roughly 43,000 square meters.

The heart of the garden is Sensui, a 9,000-square-meter freshwater pond that draws its design inspiration from West Lake in Hangzhou, China. Four islands punctuate the water: the central Nakajima, accessible by two bridges, and the smaller Ukishima, Oshima, and Yukimi-toro. Rocks on the central island are arranged to suggest the mountains surrounding West Lake -- a miniature Chinese landscape transplanted to Japanese soil. One corner of the pond holds Suhama, a sandy beach area that recalls the garden's coastal origins. The circular path around Sensui climbs to the park's highest point, Oyama hill, from which a dry stone waterfall called Karetaki cascades down the slope in frozen motion. A stone lantern near the waterfall marks what was traditionally considered the best spot for snow viewing -- though Tokyo sees snow so rarely now that the opportunity comes perhaps once or twice a winter, if at all.

Japanese black pines anchor the garden's structure, their wind-shaped silhouettes unchanged since the Edo period in character if not in individual age. Camphor trees provide dense shade. The seasonal calendar unfolds in azaleas, Japanese irises, balloon flowers, and spider lilies, each taking its turn through spring, summer, and autumn. The most dramatic moment arrives in early May, when the wisteria trellis in the picnic area erupts in cascades of pale purple -- a brief, fragrant spectacle that draws crowds. Below the surface, koi carp cruise the pond alongside Eastern spot-billed ducks, little egrets, and -- in winter months -- visiting tufted ducks, northern pintails, and common pochards. The garden also hosts a Japanese archery range, a kyudo practice space that adds the occasional sharp crack of a bowstring to the ambient quiet. Beyond the garden walls, trains rattle past on tracks that were carved from the garden's own northern margin. Inside, the stillness holds.