Cultural News 2019 February Issue

Japan-born Hayahiko Takase, architect by profession and a cultural treasure within the Japanese American community in Los Angeles, passed away on Dec. 27, 2018 at White Memorial Hospital in Boyle Heights, Los Angeles. He was 88 years old.

Takase was the conceptual architect for the Terasaki Budokan Project in Little Tokyo.

Born in Tokyo in 1930, Takase graduated from Tokyo University in 1953. In an interview with the Little Tokyo Historical Society in 2010, Takase explained why he became an architect:

“Pearl Harbor had happened and I was in the 6th grade. In 1942, there was an air raid on Tokyo and I saw a 2 engine black plane flying low. Since I really liked airplanes, I had memorized all the military planes from all over the world. I was sure it was a B25. When I told the teacher and my friends this, no one believed me.” – Young Takase witnessed the first bombing raids over Tokyo.

“It was when I was in the third grade of Junior High School that I decided I wanted to be an aeronautical engineer. By then, no university had that department because Occupation Army Commander General Douglas MacArthur had stopped all studies of this major. So the problem for me, and my friends that liked making model airplanes, was what major to choose.

“Interestingly, we all picked architecture for our major. We were not so much interested in the mechanics of airplanes, but we liked the beautiful shape of the plane.  And so, architecture was a mixture of art and engineering.”

Takase went on to study architecture in the Engineering Department at Tokyo University, receiving his degree in 1953.

While in Graduate School he was asked by one of his professors to assist and accompany him to Brazil to work on the Japanese Pavilion at the first World’s Fair after WWII.

He left Japan with a stop in several of the major U.S. cities, where they looked at new architecture, before arriving in Sao Paolo. Then, after a short trip to Europe on the way back to Japan, he lucked to work at architect Minoru Yamazaki’s office in Detroit.

Minoru Yamasaki was the architect for many very famous buildings, probably the most famous was the New York Trade Center twin towers which were destroyed by the 911 attack in 2001.

Takase ended up working and studying in the U.S. Before he returned to Japan, he received a Masters in Architecture from the Graduate School of Design at Harvard University in 1956.

In 1964, Takase was sent to Los Angeles by the Kajima Corporation in Tokyo to establish Kajima International Inc., and appointed Director of Design for the Little Tokyo Redevelopment Project including the Kajima Building and the New Otani Hotel complex.

He left Kajima International Inc. in 1977 to start his own firm, Takase Associates, Inc.  In his all career, Takase had designed many of the buildings in Little Tokyo, to include: the Kajima Building, Higashi Hongwanji Buddhist Temple, New Otani Hotel and Garden, Little Tokyo Plaza, Sho Tokyo Community Parking and Miyako Hotel.

Other major structures elsewhere were the Riccar Building in Tokyo, Japan, Nissan Motor Headquarters Building in Carson, California and Seiko Instrument Headquarters in Torrance, California.

Takase became the Senior Vice President of Nikken America in 1988, then its President in 1992 until it closed its American branch. He then headed Takase Associates, Inc.

In addition to his architectural work, Takase was one of the original members of the Little Tokyo Community Development Advisory Committee appointed by Mayor Tom Bradley and served as its Vice President, Treasurer and member-at-large.

He was the board of directors of the Japanese Chamber or Commerce of Southern California for many years and has served in various positions, including president in 1999.

In 1993, he organized a campaign to provide voting rights to Japanese living overseas, which won successfully the judgment from the Supreme Court of Japan in 1998.

Takase was also on the board of Nanka Kenjinkai Kyougikai, Aurora Foundation and Keiro Retirement Home. He was the President of Japanese Overseas Voters Network LA, Nanka Todai Kai (Alumni of Tokyo University) and the founding presidents of the Los Angeles Tokyo Kai and the Los Angeles Kimono Club in 1998.

Takase was awarded the Design Honor Award from the Architectural Institute of Japan in 1964, Design Merit Award from the American Institute of Architects in 1975 and the medal, the Order of the Rising Sun, Gold and Silver Rays, by the Japanese government in the fall of 2000.  He as also awarded the Nisei Week Pioneer Award in 2005.

Takase lived at his own designed home in Woodland Hills for long time. And recently he lived at Kei Ai Intermediate Care Home in Boyle Heights. He was survived by wife Sumiko, daughter Maya Takase Kay, and two grandsons.

The memorial meeting for Hayahiko Takase is set on April 27 at 2:30 pm at the Union Church of Los Angeles in Little Tokyo. For information about the memorial, email info@culturalnews.com .

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