Reminiscing the landscape of the Hokkaido plateau and the Master of Living, Mr. Fumiaki Takano

 I became acquainted with Mr. Fumiaki Takano through the Luodong Sports Park project of Takano Landscape Planning. In fact, whenever Mr. Takano visited Taiwan, we would dine together along with the Taiwan branch manager, Mr. Toshiya Ishimura. I’ve also encountered Mr. Takano on different occasions across different countries during the annual meetings of IFLA, of which I’ve been a member for over 30 years.

He was one of the few established Japanese landscape architects who spoke fluent English. Born in 1944 in Tianjin, China, Mr. Takano graduated from the School of Agriculture in Hokkaido University. After working in the field for a couple of years, he went back to school and studied at the College of Environment and Design in Georgia University and worked at Simons and Simonds in Pittsburgh, USA upon his graduation. In 1975, he went back to Japan to establish the Takano Landscape Planning Co. Ltd. in Tokyo. As he used to live in Hokkaido, he had a soft spot for the majestic mountainous landscapes, and especially enjoyed riding horses on the plateau. He also loved the pristine forests that remained largely untouched by man, so much so that it led him to delve deeper into the community culture under the phenological conditions of the plateau wetland affected on high-latitudes. In 1990, he eventually moved his company to Hokkaido. An internationally renowned landscape planning company would rarely ever voluntarily relocate to remote and secluded pastures.

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