3853 N. St. Mary's Street
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The Japanese Tea Garden reopened in March 2008, with fanfare that included a serenade of Japanese songs by Tafoyalla Middle School Japanese students, keyboard by Carol Gulley, calligraphy and origami demonstrations, and an enormous Koi-shaped cake. The garden had been closed while the San Antonio Parks and Recreation Department and the San Antonio Parks Foundation completed infrastructure rehabilitation to the facility, to include walkways, piping, filtration, wall repairs, and pond sealing. The restored garden features a lush year-round garden and a floral display with shaded walkways, stone bridges, a 60-foot waterfall and ponds filled with Koi. The project cost $1,587,470 funded from public and private sources including the City of San Antonio, the San Antonio Parks Foundation, and Friends of the Parks.
Members of the Jingu family, which lived and worked in the Garden, in the 1920s, attended the ceremony, along with the descendents of Ray Lambert, the Park Commissioner who conceived of the idea of turning an abandoned rock quarry into a "lily pond," also attended.
Admission to the Garden is free. The Parks Foundation now plans to pursue another phase that will feature the renovation of the Jingu house. Construction will start this summer on this project. As a result of the construction, reservations will be unavailable during the summer months. However, the Garden will remain open to the general public. If you have further questions, call 210-207-3053 during regular business hours Monday through Friday. Hours at the garden are dawn to dusk.
For more information about the Garden, check out the Japanese Tea Garden history on our history page.
For more information on future plans for the Garden, click on Master Plan (PDF).