Wisteria are one of the most beloved flowers in Japan and with reasons, these flowers are stunningly beautiful that you would like to see in spring. Are you really planning to visit Japan either in late April or early May?
I simply love Japanese wisteria for its beautiful blooms. Every spring, I prefer visiting some very iconic wisteria gardens in Japan and they are obviously worth checking out, especially if you love flowers. Let’s take a look at 10 interesting facts about Japanese wisteria.
Japanese Wisteria Facts:
1. Wisteria in Japanese is called Fuji, which typically blooms around late April and early May. In northern Japan—places like Hokkaido, where winter is usually longer than in mainland Japan—wisteria can be seen until late May.
2. Japanese wisteria is native to Japan. There are many varieties of wisteria, with different colors and sizes, such as light purple, white, and pink blooms. Shiro Noda is a popular wisteria variety in Japan that attracts many people for its pure white flowers.
3. It symbolizes good luck, kindness, love, and longevity.
4. Kawachi Fujien Wisteria Garden and Ashikaga Flower Park are the most famous places in Japan to admire the beauty of wisteria blooms. They are recognized as one of the most beautiful places in Japan to explore every spring after cherry blossoms are gone.
5. Depending on the variety, Japanese wisteria can grow faster, often reaching up to 10 meters (30 feet) in height. They can live for decades. For example, at Ashikaga Flower Park, there is an over 160-year-old wisteria called the Great Wisteria, which spreads over a tatami trellis area. It’s an icon of this flower park, no doubt about that!
6. Japanese wisteria flowers are not like sakura (cherry blossoms)! Do you know why? They have a strong, sweet fragrance that the legendary sakura don’t have.
7. Wisteria flowers appear in literature, paintings, and art. Utagawa Hiroshige is one of the renowned Japanese artists and is the leading landscape artist of the Ukiyo-e woodblock printing tradition. His work “Wisteria at Kameido Tenjin Shrine” is popular woodblock print published in 1856, featuring dangling wisteria flowers, figures walking over a tall bridge in a traditional Japanese garden. This woodblock print is a part of Hiroshige’s series One Hundred Famous Views of Edo.
8. Fuji Musume (“Wisteria Maiden”) is a well-known traditional dance from Japan’s Kabuki theatre. It was first staged in 1826 at Nakamura-za in Edo and was initially part of a five-dance series.
9. The oldest fabric in Japan was made using the fibers of wisteria vines. It’s called Fuji-fu (wisteria cloth); it was recognized as a Tangible Cultural Property of Japan in 1991.
10. Although the flowers are pretty beautiful to see, all parts of the wisteria plant are toxic to humans and pets!
