Kyu-Iwasaki-Tei Garden

Kyu-Iwasaki-tei Garden in Tokyo's Taito ward was once the residence of the Iwasaki family, founders of the Mitsubishi conglomerate, and sits near Ueno Park. The surviving estate from 1896 is a rare intact example of Meiji-era industrial elite life: Iwasaki Hisaya commissioned the British architect Josiah Conder to design a two-storey wooden mansion in English Jacobean style with panelled salons and a hanging garden pavilion connected directly to the traditional Japanese living wing - the Western and Japanese houses share a single complex. Between them stretches an English-style landscape lawn with old black pines. The property is protected as an Important Cultural Property of Japan and counts among Tokyo's nine prefectural gardens; only about a third of the original grounds survives.