Made Wijaya

Made Wijaya (1953–2016), born in Sydney as Michael White, arrived in Bali in 1973 and, fascinated by the island’s culture, decided to settle there permanently. As a young architecture student, he began teaching tennis and English, then became a tour guide and journalist, before devoting himself to gardening and landscape architecture.

After a trip to Great Britain in 1979, where he visited Kew Gardens and several classic English gardens, he received his first major commission: the gardens of the Bali Oberoi Hotel. From then on, he developed a unique style, combining architectural rigor and tropical creativity, which earned him international renown. Made Wijaya has designed more than 600 private and public gardens in Southeast Asia and around the world, including David Bowie’s garden on the island of Mustique and the Naples Botanical Garden in Florida.

Author of The Complete Stranger in Paradise and Balinese Architecture: Towards an Encyclopedia, he also contributes to Tropical Asian Style and a tourist guide to Bali. He founded the Wijaya Classics collection, dedicated to furniture, lighting, and decorative objects. A lecturer at the National University of Singapore, he encourages the new generation of architects and landscape designers to consider gardens as an art form in their own right.

In all his work, Made Wijaya pays tribute to his adopted island, Bali, where he has left a lasting legacy in tropical architecture and landscaping.

He is the author of Architecture of Bali and Contemporary Tropical Gardens, published by Éditions du Pacifique.