Gardens by the Bay's 10th cherry blossom event will feature not only 440 trees, but also a 'Phantom Castle' and bamboo lanterns

Japan in February is still in the depths of winter, its countryside filled with bare trees, when The Straits Times visits.

- Yamini Chinnuswamy

In March, the wintry landscape will be transformed into a panoply of pale pink, when Japan's sakura or cherry blossoms emerge in springtime.

Thanks to Gardens by the Bay (GBTB), however, the delicate beauty of sakura can be experienced year after year in Singapore's climate-controlled Flower Dome.

The sakura display has been a constant in the gardens' annual calendar since 2016. Its 10th edition in 2025 will be its biggest, with more than 440 cherry trees, representing 48 varieties, taking root in the Flower Dome from March 8 to April 6.

Half of these trees arrived from Japan in late February, and were carefully unloaded from their climate-controlled shipping containers over a few consecutive nights.

Sharp-eyed visitors may have noticed these trees already in place at the Flower Dome, although these are still bare of blossoms.

The horticultural team has worked its magic to ensure that the trees will bloom closer to opening day—and continue to flower over the one-month season of the display.

ST goes behind the scenes in Japan for glimpses of how the 2025 floral festival has come together, from sakura selection to lantern crafting.

CHOOSING SAKURA TREES, INCLUDING ONE THAT WEEPS

About 100km north of Tokyo, in Japan's Tochigi prefecture, the Mount Nantai volcano looms over the serene countryside between Utsunomiya, the prefecture's capital, and the much smaller city of Kanuma.

It is in this countryside that sakura farmer Shuhei Inamori, 45, grows and nurtures sakura trees for export to other parts of Japan—and to Singapore.

He has been one of GBTB's sakura suppliers since 2018, and has sent some 220 cherry trees for the 2025 event—half of the total number of trees to be showcased. The other half were brought into Singapore from Europe.