Chelsea Flower Show Lecture: Kazuyuki Ishihara

Born in Nagasaki, Japan in 1958, at 22 Kazuyuki Ishihara studied the Japanese art of flower arrangement, Ikebana. Inspired by the flower shops of Paris, he began selling flowers on the street before opening his own flower shops, followed by his company and gardens. Bringing elements of Japanese garden design like stone gardens, bonsai and moss into his unique world style of landscaping, his designs have been highly acclaimed at the Chelsea Flower Show in the UK since 2004. Renowned as the pinnacle of international gardening shows, Kazuki Ishihara has won an unprecedented total of 12 gold medals between 2006 and 2023. The late Queen Elizabeth II declared him to be a “Magician of Greenery” after visiting the Chelsea Flower Show and seeing his work.

Jason James has been Director General of the Daiwa Anglo-Japanese Foundation since October 2011. Having been fascinated by Japan on a choir tour at the age of 13, he chose to read Japanese Studies at King’s College, Cambridge, where he was a double scholar (academic and choral), graduating First Class with Distinction in 1987. From 2007-2011 Mr. James was Director of the British Council in Tokyo, during which time he also served as Chair of the European Union National Institutes of Culture Japan cluster, a Board Member of the Japan-British Society (and Chair of its Awards Committee), and a Board Member of United World Colleges Japan.

Mr James’s interest in Japan is broad, covering the economy, financial markets and tax, as well as Japanese history, literature and arts, and the relationship between the UK and Japan. Publications range from The Political Economy of Japanese Financial Markets (co-author, Macmillan 1999), to Edmund Blunden and Japan (Asiatic Society, 2010).