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Feng Shui Garden

Feng Shui for Small Gardens

City dwellers, despite their relatively small garden space, can also introduce feng shui to their apartments. The presence of plants on a patio, terrace, or doorway attracts vitalizing chi.

• Potted plants, hanging baskets, and window boxes are excellent; located at the threshold of your home, they draw the energy of the garden inside.
• If you have a sunny space, plant bright flowers, such as geraniums, begonias, marigolds and petunias; their colourful vitality will balance the dark interior of an apartment.
• In even a small space, create an arrangement of pebbles, wood, and plants to balance yin and yang energies.
• A miniature fountain surrounded by ferns and other greenery soothes the eye and the ear.
• Sculpture, wind chimes, and empty ornamental vases or bowls also encourage auspicious chi to visit and settle.

Whether you have a green thumb or are just beginning to garden, the principles of feng shui can add to the success of your garden. More importantly, feng shui can add immeasurably to the quality of your life. When we cultivate our feng shui garden, we cultivate our soul and experience the harmony of the universe.
Water, wood, fire, earth, and metal are very important in feng shui. Everything in the universe is made of these elements, and no one element is better or more valuable than another. In feng shui gardens, all elements co-exist in harmony. Feng shui gardeners skillfully engineer the interplay of elements to bring about creative, auspicious energy. They interpret elemental interactions as either positive or negative.

• The positive cycle of influence is: water produces à wood (plants), which produces > fire > earth > metal > water, ad infinitum. The logic of this cycle is obvious; for example, the burning of wood which produces ashes or earth.
• The negative or "controlling" cycle of influence is: water > fire > metal > wood > earth > water, and so on. For example, water destroys fire by putting it out, fire can melt metal, and metal saws, knives, and nails can cut trees and plants.

Thus, in our gardens, if we have too much sunlight, we add water as a balancing element to cool and nourish the wood. If the land is flooded or soggy, we introduce rocks or mound up earth as a dam because earth controls water in the cycle of negative influence.

Each element is associated with specific colours, shapes, seasons and locations on the compass (see Ba Gua). By working with the interplay of such variants, feng shui masters accentuate auspicious energy. For example, circular shapes belong to the metal realm; thus, a round flowerbed is not fortunate because metal has a negative effect on wood. Instead, plant flowers in an undulating border or a rectangular bed since the wavy form represents water (positive for wood) and the rectangle resembles the column-shape that is associated with wood.

TheBa gua is a mystical representation of the eight trigrams of the I-Ching, an ancient Chinese divining tool. The hexagonal compass is used to analyze one's interior and exterior environment. Each of the directions governs a different aspect of life (for example: south= fame, achievement, east=health, harmony, southwest=marriage, romance, etc.) and is associated with a specific element, shape, or colour. Once the garden is aligned with the compass, it is easier to design the most propitious placement of plants, furniture, and other content. In recent times, some schools of feng shui gardening have rejected the compass directions and use the entrance of the house (or office or garden) as the reference point. In either case, specific areas of the space are associated with specific aspirations and one arranges the space to enhance one's fortune.