Chrysanthemum Festival

Begun in 1890, Kasama Inari's Chrysanthemum Festival is Japan's oldest. In 1908, shrine gardens were established as a place for the exhibition of chrysanthemum flowers, thereby providing parishioners with a calming atmosphere, and stimulating their sense of closeness to the earth ; since that time, the shrine's Chrysanthemum Festival has grown larger each year. In 1948, an exhibition of "chrysanthemum mannequins" - human figures formed from chrysanthemum blooms - was added ; the festival is now known as one of Japan's representative flower celebrations, drawing some 600,000 visitors from throughout the nation.