Visiting the GSBF Collection at The Huntington

Last weekend I had a fantastic visit to the GSBF Collection at The Huntington. I was in town for the Bonsai-A-Thon, the garden’s annual fundraiser, as a visiting artist sponsored by Joshua Roth (thanks, John and Michelle!).

The garden much bigger than it was when I last visited (more than twenty years ago!) and there were far more trees in the collection. All were in great shape – a testament to the incredible work of Ted Matson and the volunteers who help maintain the garden week after week.

Ted recently handed off his duties as curator to Daniel Deephouse who provided a tour of the facility and offered a glimpse of what he wants to focus on this year (finding ways to strengthen connections between the garden, the collection, and the community).

Here are some of the trees we appreciated on our tour of the garden.

Cedar Elm

California juniper

Chinese elm

California juniper

Shohin display

One of my favorite trees in the collection is a large coast live oak. I like that the tree looks like a mature oak growing in nature.

Coast live oak

California juniper

News & Updates

• The Mammoth Fundraiser for the Bonsai Garden at Lake Merritt is this weekend! The auction will be held Saturday, March 1st, at 1:00 (preview at 12:00). You can browse the catalog online here. Sunday features sales items and vendors – I’ll have tools, supplies and akadama on hand. Learn more at the event website.

• Save the date: this year’s Naka Memorial Exhibition will be held on August 16-17, 2025, at the George J. Doizaki Gallery during the Nisei Week Festival at JACC. Learn more about the event – and find instructions for submitting your trees – at the event website.

• Looking for original Japanese artwork or fine art monoprints? Learn more about Gyotaku.