A Japanese garden is a wonderfully peaceful place. Perhaps it is the attention paid to every detail within: the placement of rocks, bonsai pine trees pruned one needle at a time. In Japan, gardening is on par with the study of architecture and fine art, and gardeners take their profession quite seriously.

In the United States, our relatively brief history of gardening has been inspired by English and French garden styles. Neatness, straight lines and beds are characteristic; colorful rose bushes and exotic species are admirable features of an American garden. Japanese gardens are quite the opposite of what we are used to, but Asian-inspired gardens are intriguing Americans in the Southeast. It is the Japanese tradition of creating sanctuaries out of backyards that entices Americans in the South, and the similarities between our climates makes it that much more appealing.

A Japanese garden emulates its surroundings and its key purpose is to harmonize the home with nature. It serves as a spiritual haven. Accordingly, a Japanese garden will never appear to stand out from the landscape—native plants and natural components such as river rock and mountain stone are used to create a garden that is interconnected with its surroundings. In fact, rocks are the most important component in a Japanese garden, according to Masashi "Mike" Oshita. A master Japanese gardener in Asheville, North Carolina, Oshita has been designing and building Japanese gardens in the South since 1986. He is one of only 65 Japanese gardeners in the U.S. listed by the Japanese Garden Research Network and the only classically trained one in North Carolina (he studied at Nishinihon College and under three master gardeners in Japan). Oshita is considered the foremost expert on Japanese-style gardening in the South. He personally touches every rock that is placed in every garden he designs. "Rocks have seven faces, seven ways to place them," Oshita says. "Rock placement is like the frame of the house. It’s one of the most important things in Japanese gardens; plants come second."

"Large rocks are ‘master rocks.’ Place them first, then smaller rocks, then arrange plants around them," he explains. Rocks are always placed in odd numbers, a trait borrowed from Ikebana, the Japanese art of flower arrangement, which arranges everything in threes representing heaven, man and the earth. Oshita says odd numbers and different sizes are also better for balance.

As a country surrounded by the sea, Japan has always placed an important emphasis on water; its ebb and flow is considered a reminder of the passage of time. Since a Japanese garden is a small reflection of the world itself, water is essential, whether it is represented literally or figuratively. Even if you don’t have a babbling brook in your backyard, water can be incorporated. A pond filled with spotted koi fish is a grand addition to a Japanese garden, especially since koi fish can cost thousands of dollars and live up to 200 years! In Duane and Peggy McKibbin’s garden, Oshita created a water basin out of a rock with a dip in it that he found in the couple’s backyard. Its placement is inspired by the basins used in traditional Japanese tea gardens. Duane says he was using the rock as a water dish for his dog, but finds the water feature with its soothing trickle a much more pleasant use, especially as it is the first thing guests see and hear when walking up to the McKibbins’ front door.

Duane and Peggy, retired small business owners, live in the heart of the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina. Their new home is a project close to their hearts. The house itself is located on a bluff, with a spectacular panoramic view of the misty blue mountains and Hendersonville in the distance. It was designed by Linville, North Carolina Architect David Patrick Moses, in a style Peggy calls "contemporary Oriental." The McKibbins have always been fascinated by Asian culture. "We’re both from California and there’s a large Asian population out there," Peggy explains. "We’ve been to the Orient four times and the gardens are the highlight."

So when the owner of a local nursery told them about Oshita, the McKibbins were thrilled. They quickly hired him and gave him free reign over the yard. Oshita started by replanting the 70 year-old Japanese maple from the McKibbins’ old house to the center of the new home’s circular driveway. "We had to bring it with us," Duane says, and if they ever move again, so will the impressive old maple. Oshita created a dry landscape in the McKibbins’ backyard, inspired by the Zen gardens found in Japan. Large boulders terrace the garden into three different levels that eventually lead you to the edge of the bluff. A dry creek bed, whose rocks were individually selected and placed by Oshita, forms the illusion of a stream. A stone-filled path winds its way around the backyard past a black pine bonsai tree, azaleas, dogwoods and impatiens, which Oshita says he is about to replace with pansies. The pinks and purples that dot the garden are not in line with Zen gardening rules, but again, Oshita says it is more important to create a garden that suits the individual homeowner. He says, "I harmonize with this environment. So this is Appalachian-Japanese garden."

The McKibbins "couldn’t be happier" with their motley landscape. "It’s very peaceful and easy to live with," Peggy says. "It doesn’t fight back."

A Japanese garden is enclosed, either with fences and gates or shrubs and trees, in order "to become a microcosm of nature," writes Scott Reil on his web site, The Helpful Gardener. "For the garden to be a true retreat," says Reil, "we must first seal it away from the outside world." As with water, this can be taken literally or figuratively. The McKibbins’ garden is isolated because it sits on the edge of a bluff; low bushes surrounding a garden can be considered its border; trees surrounding the backyard could also be considered shelter from the outside world. Regardless, enclosure is necessary to instill that safe, tranquil feeling one gets in a Japanese garden.

Balance and the existence of space are also important components. For gardeners who are accustomed to filling every available space (the more color, the better!), a Japanese garden may seem empty or unfinished. In actuality, it is the Buddhist concept of nothingness that influences the Japanese gardener—without nothing, you cannot have something.

Perhaps the best advice comes from David Engel, author of "Japanese Gardens for Today." He advises, "The modern garden builder can learn more from a walk in the woods, fields and mountains than from all the home and garden magazines and manuals. Interest, love of nature, patience, open eyes and curiosity are the only tools he needs."