Katsura Imperial Villa is evidence that good design lasts forever. Designated a cultural treasure by the Japanese, this garden – said to be the most beautiful in Japan according to the Imperial Household Agency – and its buildings were completed in 1645 and used as a royal residence. The design of the  villas and its tea houses are simple, due to the influence of zen buddhism, and look as modern now as they may have done more than four hundred years ago. Its garden is also said to be the model for subsequent strolling gardens.

I visited Katsura Villa in both summer and winter. I hope to visit again in the fall and spring as I just want to see what the garden looks like in the different seasons. Between summer and winter, I think summer was more impressive with the green of the trees adding more colour contrast. Details and photos of my visit follow below. This blog adds more details and information to an earlier blog about Kyoto’s imperial villas (see earlier blog).

Visit Approval Process: Up to six tours are available daily (except Sundays, public holidays and some Saturdays) and you have to apply for a slot by going in person to the Imperial Household Agency office in Kyoto with your passport. There are also limited slots available for online application. Alternatively, your hotel concierge may be able to undertake the application for you for a small fee – usually to cover the cost of the cab fare. Some tour agents may also offer to do this for you for a fee. Try to reserve a slot early as I believe they try to limit each visit slot to around 30 people as the paths at Katsura Villa are quite narrow. By the way, you must be 18-years old and over to do the tour – I guess if you can drink legally, you can be trusted not to damage property.

Visit Highlights:

On arrival, we were herded into a visitor waiting room to wait for others before they start the guided tour and there is an introductory video to watch. If you don’t speak Japanese, there is an audio guide available. Unfortunately, I suspect explanation in the audio guides contain less detail than that from the Japanese guide so you may want to bring your own book on Katsura Villa. To note: you have to bring your passport with you to enter.

Because we enter by the “service” entrance, we start the tour by walking toward the official main gate, which is actually a simple looking bamboo gate with a thickly thatched roof. Along the way, there was a beautiful Suminoe Pine tree that was planted to screen the view, ensuring that no one can see the garden without walking around.

After the main gate and passing by a section called Sosetsu-yama, where sago palms are planted, the lake comes into view. Across the lake is a tea house, Shokintei.

There were a few continuous ooh and aah moments from here and of course, a lot of photo taking. This is where the guard shepherding us around starts to hover closer, to make sure we don’t fall behind the group.

The idea behind the tea house, Shokintei, is to relax and enjoy the view of the garden. No doubt, with a view like the one above, Prince Toshihito and his heir, Prince Toshitada succeeded in achieving their goals when building Katsura Villa.

In winter, the view from near the same location is less lush, but still beautiful.

Further along, there’s a gentle climb to a smaller tea house, Shokatei, from which we got an elevated view of the lake and garden.  There are some exceptionally pretty points as we descended from Shokatei.

We then passed a larger and more ornate structure on the left- Onrindo – which used to house the memorial tablets of the family. From here, we walked over the curved bridge, which you can see in the photo below.

The next structure is the third teahouse, Shoiken. From Shoiken, I got a good picture of Onrindo – like the one I took above. Structurally, I liked Shoiken, which is pictured at the beginning of this article. The screen doors frame a view of green trees behind the building. From Shoiken, as we walked toward the main residence of Katsura Villa, there was a great view of the central island in the lake. There’s usually a heron hanging out there.

The main residence, called Ko Shoin, actually comprises of four linked structures. We didn’t go into this section. But the last structure that we could look into before ending the tour is my favourite – Gepparo, which translates to Pavilion of the Moon and Waves. This is a tea cottage that was used for moon gazing. The cottage opens up onto a sweeping view of the lake.

This was the end of the tour. A long bamboo fence leads to the exit.

Before finally leaving, there is one more chance to get a photo of the Suminoe Pine that screens the view of the lake. The guards can actually be a bit more patient now since they know that we are about to leave.

Getting here and back: I took a cab here as I was running late. There are taxis easily available if you need to take one to get to your next stop. Otherwise, Katsura Villa is around a 20 minute walk from the Katsura train station, from which the Hankyu train is available that can take you back to central Kyoto or to Arashiyama. There’s bus stop outside Katsura Villa but as it’s a long ride to town or to Arashiyama, you may want to change to a train (you could take the bus to the train station).

Time allocation: Allocate around one hour for the visit and one hour to and fro transport time if you are staying in central Kyoto. It takes around 25 minutes by car to get to Katsura Villa and at least 30 minutes by train from the Kawaramachi Hanku station if you plan to walk from the station to the site. It’s probably more efficient to pair a visit to Katsura Villa with one to Kokedera, also known as the moss temple (see my comments on Kokedera), if you can get the visit time slots to fit.