Send Flowers to Sakai, Japan

Just south of Osaka across the Yamato River, Sakai is a city with a much longer memory than its suburban appearance suggests. The enormous keyhole-shaped burial mounds of the Mozu group, including the tomb attributed to Emperor Nintoku, sit in the middle of residential neighbourhoods. In the sixteenth century this was a wealthy, self-governing merchant port, and the tea master Sen no Rikyu was born here.

That heritage lives on in workshops making kitchen knives, incense and traditional sweets, and in a local fondness for the tea ceremony, where a single seasonal flower in the alcove is part of the ritual. Understated, seasonal arrangements are well understood in Sakai.

Today most residents commute to Osaka, living in houses and apartment blocks across Sakai, Kita and Minami wards, the last of which includes the large Senboku new town. Flower delivery in Sakai is next-day, Monday to Saturday, when you order before midnight Japan time. Same-day and Sunday delivery are not available in Japan.

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