Buddha – the new gnome?
They are called the baby-boomer generation, those people who are transforming their gardens into Zen meditation spaces or loggias, installing hot tubs or setting up huge stainless steel water features on the lawn. This is the generation that has travelled the world, and now they have settled in what they hope will be their final homes, they are bringing to them the cosmopolitan tastes and lavish landscape designs that are inspired by trips to Tuscany or Thailand. Allied to this architectural hodge-podge is their interest in the environment, organics and natural products generally.
Recent innovations in the ‘outdoor is the new indoor’ craze include the outdoor kitchen complete with bread oven and the outdoor living room with loggia, swing chairs and garden heaters.
Where does this leave the concrete gnome with his little red hat and fishing rod? Well he’s been almost completely replaced in the new horticultural décor. Like the wishing well and the bird bath, the gnome has been relegated, replaced by the Buddha, the water feature and the sun dial.
But the inspiration behind the gnome’s relegation is as old and domestic as his arrival in Britain in the late 1800s. The Buddha is an interloper whose arrival has been prompted both by cheap air travel which has led to many more people visiting the Far East and Asia, and the craze for Feng Shui, which says that a Buddha statue brings health and wealth, especially if you rub its belly. Just as the gnome represented the fad destination of Germany for the Victorian tourist, the Buddha speaks of a visit to the Orient, and while the gnome was supposed to be hard-working and house-proud, the Buddha stands for prosperity and serenity – the more things change, the more they stay the same!
Buddha photograph by Buddha Rhubarb, used under a creative commons attribution licence.
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