Japan

A thousand years of capital city, arranged around temples, gardens and the idea that a view should be composed rather than found.

Kyoto is moss, bamboo, vermilion torii in their thousands, and gold leaf reflected in a still pond. North in the Japan Alps the country turns rural and steep — thatched farmhouses under deep snow, castles on the plain, and a valley at Kamikōchi that fills with larch gold for two weeks each autumn.