Bonsai Tree Sculpture

These are creations of artist Takanori Aiba who worked in the 1970s as a maze illustrator for a Japanese fashion magazine. The next decade he worked as an architect and finally in 2003 decided to merge the two crafts – the design of physical space and the drawing of mazes – into these detailed tiny worlds.

He uses craft paper, plastic, plaster, acrylic resin, paint and other materials to construct sprawling miniature communities that wrap around bonsai trees.