Simply sign up to the Life & Arts myFT Digest -- delivered directly to your inbox. Masahiko Kimura’s bonsai garden is a short taxi ride from Hasuda station in Omiya ward, an hour by train north of ...

In the winter of 2002, a young American named Ryan Neil joined an unusual pilgrimage: he and several others flew to Tokyo, to begin a tour of Japan’s finest collections of bonsai trees. He was ...

If you’ve ever wanted to grow a bonsai, you only need to visit a nursery that specializes in these twisting miniature trees. Bonsai, which came to Japan from China in the 12th century, is the art of ...

Kimura Masahiko is a legend of the bonsai world who has won the Prime Minister’s Award, one of the industry’s highest honors, 27 times. He talks about creating original works that break the mold. In ...

Ryan Neil is the first to admit it. Life would have been a lot easier for him if he had chosen to pursue a career in something like business.”Sometimes I feel like, ‘Why couldn’t I have picked ...

Story update: The exhibition "American Bonsai: The Unbridled Art of Ryan Neil" runs at the Portland Japanese Garden May 21–June 19, 2016. When most Americans think of bonsai — the craft of pruning and ...

The centuries-old craft is thriving as both a hobby and an art form, with contemporary practitioners around the world asking what lessons it can impart today. Bonsai created by the Japanese artist ...

On first glance, Ryan Neil doesn’t appear to fit the mold of a bonsai master. He’s young, American, and buff, with the boyish good looks of a Tom Brady. But appearances can be deceiving. Neil, who ...

The Japanese art of bonsai, or growing miniature potted trees, requires such devotion that the plants are treated almost like religious artifacts, treasured and rarely photographed. So it was ...