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The garden in its design aims to reflect the course of Lafcadio Hearn’s life, and to encapsulate themes from his many books running through the elements of the garden. The objective is to create a garden of international importance, appealing to lovers Japanese gardens and literary fans worldwide of Hearn alike. Waterford is the capital of the South East of Ireland and Ireland’s oldest city.

Hearn (27 June 1850 – 26 September 1904), was an international writer, known best for his books about Japan, especially his collections of Japanese legends and ghost stories, such as Kwaidan: Stories and Studies of Strange Things.

The proposal is to transform the grounds of Tramore House, Co. Waterford, Ireland into a memorial garden honouring Hearn who spent his boyhood summers in Tramore. Known as Patrick Hearn during his earlier years in Ireland, as an adult he adopted his middle name, Lafcadio Hearn, and later in Japan, he found fame as Koizumi Yakumo.

In 1890, Hearn went to Japan with a commission as a newspaper correspondent, and it was in Japan that he found a home and his greatest inspiration. Hearn gained a teaching position during the summer of 1890 at the Shimane Prefectural Common Middle School and Normal School in Matsue, a town in western Japan on the coast of the Sea of Japan. During his fifteen-month stay in Matsue, Hearn married Koizumi Setsu, the daughter of a local samurai family, with whom he had four children. He became a naturalized Japanese, in 1896 after accepting a teaching position in Tokyo.

In the late 19th century, Japan was still largely unknown and exotic to Westerners. However, with the introduction of Japanese aesthetics, particularly at the Paris Exposition Universelle of 1900, Japanese styles became fashionable in Western countries. Consequently, Hearn became known to the world by his writings concerning Japan, offering the West some of its first descriptions of pre-industrial and Meiji Era Japan, and as such his work has historical value.

The theme and design of the proposed Japanese Gardens in Tramore, County Waterford will reflect and mirror his extraordinary journey through life, from West to East and from his lonely early years in Ireland to the extraordinary stature he achieved in his later life in Japan.

The project promoter is the well established and highly respected voluntary organisation, Tramore Development Trust, working in partnership with Waterford County Council. The concept for the Memorial Garden was stimulated by the visit to Tramore in September 2012 of Professor Koizumi Bon, great grandson of Lafcadio Hearn, and his wife Koizumi Shoko.

More details about the garden and its progress can be found here.