Japanese Honour, Order of the Rising Sun, conferred upon Irish Woman Agnes Aylward

The Cabinet Office of Japan has announced the recipients of the Autumn 2025 Conferment of Decorations on Foreign Nationals.
 
The Embassy of Japan in Ireland is delighted to share that it has been decided to confer upon Ms Agnes Aylward the Order of the Rising Sun, Gold and Silver Rays, in recognition of her work introducing Japanese culture in Ireland & contributing to friendship and good will between Japan and Ireland.
 
Ms Aylward is the founder and chairperson of the Lafcadio Hearn Japanese Gardens in Tramore, Co. Waterford.
 
The Gardens opened in 2015 and have welcomed many notable guests, including Her Imperial Highness Princess Takamado, many Japanese and Irish politicians (including most recently the Taoiseach, Micheál Martin), and some of Lafcadio Hearn’s own descendants. 
 
Hearn, an Irishman, was a journalist, translator, author, and teacher who moved to Japan and became a Japanese subject in the late 19th century.

There he translated Japan’s folklore to English, and wrote extensively about the Japan of his day, introducing Japan to many westerners for the first time.

He is perhaps the most famous Irishman in Japan, and the gardens in Tramore, where he spent much of his childhood, honour his legacy in Ireland.
 
The Gardens are open to the public year-round and are instrumental in fostering a deeper knowledge of Japanese culture and folklore, and Eastern mythology, to tens of thousands of visitors annually from Ireland and all over the world.

The Gardens have featured on several Irish national TV and radio programmes, including ‘Nationwide,’ ‘No Place Like Home,’ and ‘Neven’s Coastal Food Trails.’
 
Find the Lafcadio Hearn Japanese Gardens homepage here: https://www.lafcadiohearngardens.com/
 
The Embassy expresses its sincere congratulations to Mrs Aylward for this achievement, and Mrs Aylward offers her sincere thanks to the dedicated team she leads and to Waterford Council for its support and decision to lease the site of the gardens when the project was purely at the conceptual stage.