Shinshuen

Shinshuen is a full-scale Chinese landscape garden, gifted by the city of Shenyang to mark the fifth anniversary of the two cities' friendship agreement and opened in 1987. It sits tucked into a corner of Daishi Park, a few minutes' walk from the temple at Kawasaki Daishi.

The name is a compression of the idea behind it: shin from Shenyang, shu meaning fine or excellent – a garden gathering together the best of Shenyang's scenery. The materials came with it. The glazed tiles, the timber joinery, the stone lions at the gate, and the Taihu stone were all donated by the city, which is why the place doesn't read as a pastiche.

Beyond the gate the layout follows classical Chinese principles rather than Japanese ones – a pond called Shuko at the centre, a waterfall, willows, and pavilions positioned to frame particular views. The pair of lions guarding the entrance are male on the right, female on the left. Past them stands a Taihu stone, a pitted, contorted limestone of the type prized in Chinese gardens for centuries, quarried from Lake Tai near Suzhou and inscribed with characters meaning "piled clouds".

Three pavilions ring the water, and the nice detail is that each has a painted ceiling. Chishuntei looks straight out at the waterfall, with spring painted overhead. Gukosha faces the lotus pond, with summer above – worth timing a visit for, since the lotuses flower in high summer. Ransuitei sits at the highest point, with the whole garden laid out below and a waterfall running beside it.

Everything else turns over with the seasons: magnolia, wild azalea, hydrangea, enkianthus, flowering quince, and winterhazel are all planted through the grounds, so there's rarely a dead month. It's small enough to see in half an hour and quiet enough to sit in for longer, and it costs nothing.