The 1923 Great Kantō earthquake and resulting fire devastated Tokyo , and gutted the downtown area where many bonsai specimens were grown . And so , two years later , a group of thirty families of downtown Tokyo professional growers established the Ōmiya Bonsai Village , northeast of the capital . The first great annual public exhibition of trees was held at the Asahi Newspaper Hall in Tokyo in 1927 . The first of the very prestigious Kokufu-ten exhibitions were held in Tokyo 's Ueno Park , beginning in 1934 . By the following year , tokonoma display principles allowed for bonsai to be shown for the tree 's individual beauty , not just for its spiritual or symbolic significance
1923 Great Kantō earthquake
1923 Great Kantō earthquake
History of bonsai