Terrific Temples

Awesomely-assembled temples! Lush pink-blossomed trees! A garden so beautiful, I've burnt down my own garden (and salted the Earth so nothing can ever grow there again) out of envy! Yep, it's fair to say I'm a huge fan of today's build, a Japanese-inspired wonder created by a build team called Apenda.

In fact, whenever lead builder, PandatiX, reads the name of his build team, he laughs. “The team hadn’t a name at the start,” he tells me, “all my friends [were] using my nickname Panda instead while still keeping within the authentic style of Japanese architecture. He wanted to explore Buddhism, traditional building and nature, but also Japanese, Chinese and Buddhist architecture. The spiritual in balance with the physical. Can’t say he wants for ambition!

A lot of credit has to go to PandatiX’s mum - she’s the one who instilled a passion for architecture in him. Awww, that’s so sweet! All my mum does is bellow at me to get a real job and do my own darn laundry. But it was PandatiX’s mum’s passion that inspired him to be an architect - and this aspiration has led him to become a Minecraft builder.

The project was originally meant only as a small hub for a server of a friend. However, PandatiX is in love with what he does, and his creativity spilled out much further than was originally intended. “On this project, I drew the layout, advisers said to me that it was ‘interesting’, [then] I built, terraformed and decorated.”

At the time, PandatiX was the entirety of the Apenda build team, so for Karyiuka-ji he had to do everything himself. While his close friends lent their support and suggestions from the sidelines, PandatiX drew blueprints, researched the native architecture and structured the organic land and trees.