Japanese architecture is far better known as an architecture of timber than of earth or masonry. This lack of earth or masonry buildings can largely be attributed to the threat of earthquakes, as there is no shortage of quality building stone or clay in the country.
Where the consequences of structural failure due to earthquake are not so severe, however, stone and clay are used widely, as in the case of garden walls. In these walls can be seen the same qualities that are characteristic of Japanese craft in general: technical sophistication, close attention to aesthetic effects, a love of material variety and the juxtaposition of ‘high’ and ‘low’, and the tendency to break symmetry or monotony with what for want of a better term might be described as ‘quirks’.
A cob-and-tile garden wall with tile ‘roof’. It is unclear if the variation in this wall is the result of repairs over time or if the striated, folded effect is deliberate, inspired perhaps by rock formations. The contrast between the rustic face of the wall and the refined and ornamented hon-gawara (本瓦) tiling (a style of tiling in which flat nami-hira (並平) and half-round nami-maru )並丸) tiles are alternated) is striking.
A stepped rammed earth wall with tile capping and dry stone footing, complete with drainage ‘tunnel’. Though the rammed earth is the structural material, even these walls have timber posts set into them at intervals, to support their ‘roof’ framing.