This portrait details how painter and garden designer Alfred William Parsons (1847-1920) played a catalytic role in the growth of watercolour painting in Japan in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, considering the development of notions such as 'nature' and 'landscape'.

This portrait considers the significance of two nineteenth-century plant collectors in Japan, Robert Fortune and John Gould Veitch.

As a watercolourist of flowers and gardens, Ella Du Cane (1874-1943) helped popularize the Japanese garden amongst westerners who had never been to Japan. This essay sketches her life and impact on Anglo-Japanese relations.

Handa Taki (1871-1956) had a career as a gardener that was varied and international. This portrait details her life and dealings with gardening and gardens in Britain.

This essay details Isaac Bunting's (1850-1936) trade in lily bulbs in Japan, the growth and decline of the business, and the work and character of Bunting himself.

This portrait assesses the success of the Japan-British Exhibition of 1910 from the perspective of the Japanese organizers.

This biographical portrait describes the development of the Japanese Garden Society in the UK, and how it has increasingly sought to use gardens as a way of fostering and developing relationships between the two countries, introducing the British public to Japanese culture.

This essay details Josiah Conder's (1852-1920) life as the first advocate for the building of Japanese gardens in Britain, and his theory of Japanese garden design.

This chapter details the life of Josiah Conder (1852-1920) and his teaching of western-style architecture in Hery Dyer's new Engineering College in Tokyo as part of the Meiji regime's efforts towards modernisation. Conder inspired Japan's first generation of western-style architects, and proved to be immensely popular with the Japanese authorities, although they resisted his attempts at Japanese influences in his work.

This portait outlines the major figures of Japanese garden design in Britain, their separate contributions to the medium, and their impact upon the understanding of other aspects of Japanese culture in Britain. Includes thoughts from Eida Saburo, Suzuki Jiju, Honda Taki, and Kusumoto Seyemon.

This essay provides an account of Julian Ridsdale's (1915-2004) interest in Japan and politics, and how these two came together in his long service to Anglo-Japanese Parliamentary relations.