The Yarn | Summer 2026

(extract from print edition available in store & with all orders

Shaping the Future of Gardening

Inside Jake Hobson’s quiet cultivation of the globally admired brand, Niwaki

While studying for a Fine Art degree at The Slade in London, a young Jake Hobson was introduced to ‘Hanami’ - Japan’s cherry blossom festival - by a friend of a friend. Soon came further stories: of gardens, rituals and cultural touchstones from a country that felt worlds away from the green and pleasant upbringing of his native Hampshire.

With his interest piqued, Hobson secured The Slade’s end-of-degree travel award and travelled to Japan for a month. He arrived to observe the cherry blossom season for an assignment, but discovered something far more enduring: the gardens of Japan. He left with a lifelong fascination for the country, its people, culture and, above all, its approach to gardens.

Japan’s often paradoxical reverence for nature - and the conceptual art of tree pruning - would eventually set Hobson on the path to creating Niwaki, a lifestyle brand unlike any other.

‘Niwaki’ - ‘niwa’ meaning garden and ‘ki’ meaning tree - is both a simple and fitting name for the philosophy Hobson absorbed in Japan and has since translated for audiences in Britain and beyond, alongside his Japanese wife, Keiko.

While in Japan, Hobson became “taken with the idea that gardens are more than landscapes - they are microcosms of nature, a beautiful balance of the conceptual and the physical, and very different from gardens in England.” Once back home in England, he was determined to return to Japan. He took a TEFL qualification in order to secure a visa to work there. Before leaving, he met Keiko in London and persuaded her to move back with him, where he found work at a tree nursery in Osaka.

During that year, he visited countless gardens, but it was always the trees that captivated him most.

“Rocks are just rock. Water is natural. Building a landscape is one thing, but the trees were completely different to what I thought of as a tree,” he tells us. “I realised the difference was that, in Japan, they prune them to look like that. I thought it was almost a conceptual joke - pruning trees to look more like trees.”

It proved something of a lightbulb moment. In England, a garden tree is often selected for practicality: a safe, manageable option for a small back garden. In Japan, however, a garden tree is created through pruning — its essence preserved, but its beauty and character enhanced.

“I returned to England with a degree in Fine Art, a TEFL qualification and an obsession with Japanese trees,” Hobson says. “A completely useless set of qualifications for the world - and absolutely no idea what I wanted to do with them.”

What surprised him most was that few others seemed to articulate the same fascination. “I came back to England and looked through lots of books on Japanese gardening, all of them glossing over the magic of the garden tree,” he explains. “No other culture has this. So that became my thing.”

“The idea dawned on me that, with a pair of shears, you could give character and bring out the essence of a tree,” he says. “English topiary often removes character, whereas the Japanese way of pruning works with the tree to reveal and celebrate its essence.”

A meeting with Angus White at Architectural Plants, the influential Sussex nursery, would prove pivotal. White recognised Hobson’s passion and became an important mentor. During five years at the nursery, Hobson continued using the Japanese tools he had discovered abroad. Customers admired them and frequently asked about them. At first, he kept them to himself, but gradually he realised there might be an appetite for such beautifully made tools in England too.

Hobson and Keiko began sending faxes to contacts in Japan, importing small quantities of tools and selling them at cost to friends — a soft launch for what would become Niwaki. Over time, the business slowly gathered momentum: a press mention here, a warehouse replacing a garden shed there, outside expertise to support growth.

"We never took on huge amounts of money, and I didn’t identify as a founder at the time,” Hobson reflects. “I didn’t think I was founding anything. It was fun, gradual growth.”

“The advantage of having gone to art school rather than business school was that I made my own rules,” he says. “I didn’t have blinkers or even much of a plan. There was a confidence and freedom in creating a lifestyle brand on my own terms.”

Today, Niwaki has become a globally recognised name occupying the sweet spot between gardening, craftsmanship and lifestyle. Headquartered in Shaftesbury, with a concept store in London’s Marylebone, the brand feels more at home alongside contemporary menswear and design boutiques than traditional garden centres - Burford Garden Co. perhaps the notable exception.

It's clientele reflects that crossover appeal: design-conscious customers drawn equally to Japanese craftsmanship, functional beauty and the quiet romance of nature. In London, shoppers searching for matcha or menswear stumble across the Marylebone store and emerge converted. Others arrive more intentionally, having discovered the brand through collaborations with names such as TOAST, Paul Smith and The Conran Shop.

For Hobson, though, the appeal remains beautifully simple. He is happiest at home in his English garden with a pair of shears in hand - still guided by a lifelong love affair with Japan, art and nature and, as it turns out, possessing an equally deft touch for both pruning and brand-building.

The Snip

Three essential tools for a sculptural garden - secateurs, sheers, hori hori

Most enjoyable gardening job? Box clipping - there is a wonderful smell to it, and it has a positive impact almost immediately

Favourite item from William Crabtree? A made-to-measure Chore Jacket with long sleeves and long body (I’m 6 ft 5)

City or Country - country (but only with the opportunity of the city)

Favourite Season - autumn - I love the inevitability, it’s sense of nostalgia and melancholy

Travel destination - Japan, Tokyo especially

Comfort food - toast with marmite - my wife’s home made bread toasted on the aga

Recent read - Proust by Alain De Botton

Favourite garden - my own

A favourite tree - Cryptomeria Japonica - pruned in the Daisugi style

Music style or artist - Mozart this year inspired by son’s piano playing

Sunday pastime - pottering in the garden

Era that inspires most - 20th Century Japanese Shōwa era