In what is quite possibly the sweetest act of love ever, an elderly husband spent twenty years nurturing and building a garden so that his blind wife could smell the flowers.

Toshiyuki Kuroki has been married to his wife Yasuko for 60 years, as RocketNews24, an English language Japanese news website, reports. Living in Miyazaki Prefecture, they had spent their days looking after their dairy farm and bringing up three children.

Thirty years later, when Mrs Kuroki was 56, she was devastated by severe diabetes which caused her to go blind.

The elderly couple had planned to travel around the country after they retired, and the loss of this dream caused Mrs Kuroki to withdraw from the world, keeping herself isolated indoors.

Mr Kuroki didn’t know how to ease his wife’s pain, and walking along their 3.3 square mile farm, he looked upon a littering of pink flowers, called shibazakura. They emitted a sweet, soft smell and he had an idea:

If he plants enough flowers - a sea of flowers - while his wife wouldn't be able to see the beauty of their petals, she could experience the beauty of their scent.

He spent two years preparing the land, before planting thousands of flowers around their property.





He nurtured all the flowers, and over a decade later the garden is still thriving.

An unintended but wholly welcome consequence of his love are the 7,000 visitors a day who flock from all over the world to witness his creation.

People are drawn to the captivating garden almost as strongly as they are drawn to the love story that brought it into existence.

Needless to say, Mrs Kuroki now spends her days outside, with a perpetual smile on her face.

See a video of the garden below:



