Densho Digital Archive - Henry Nishi Interview I (denshovh-nhenry

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RP: So your, your father's new nursery in west Los Angeles kind of paralleled the development of these new communities in the west Los Angeles area.

HN: Yeah, yeah, at that time west L.A., Westwood area was just coming into, into, there were at that time when we used to drive out from, from Hollywood to, to the west L.A. area, coming, coming, taking Beverly Boulevard west to Wilshire Boulevard and coming over to, to the Westwood area, there was a lot of vacant, it was just rolling hills. UCLA was very prominent because it was the only big building that was standing. That was nice brick, beautiful brick buildings. And Westwood Village, which was being developed by Janss Investment Corporation, was just being built. This was back in that, early 1930s. And...

RP: How about Bel Air and Brentwood?

HN: Bel Air and Brentwood was also being developed. The Palisades was a little bit older. People lived in Palisades, were older buildings there, residential buildings. But the, but that area, the Bel Air area, the Westwood area, was just a new development.

RP: So your father wanted to take advantage of that, and...

HN: Yeah, yeah. I think UCLA had a lot to do with the, with the development of Westwood, Westwood Village. Because of the students coming there and people and faculty moving, moving there.

RP: So your father's... had a pretty upscale clientele at that nursery as well?

HN: Oh yeah, oh yeah. Because of the area.

RP: He had some pretty famous clients he did landscapes for.

HN: Yeah, he had a lot of, lot of well-known people as clients.

RP: Can you name a few for us?

HN: Yeah, one, one of the big names that I remember was, oh, Barrymore, John Barrymore. Yeah, he had Shirley Temple, the parents, the Temple family. Jane Withers. Tthere was others but, yeah, they had that kind of people.

RP: How did your father do... did he do the designs for these landscapes? Would he...

HN: Yeah.

RP: He would create the landscapes?

HN: Yeah, yeah.

RP: Did he draw up just rough sketches or...

HN: Rough, rough sketches, yeah.

RP: And what type of... how would you characterize your father's style as a landscape artist?

HN: Well, it... I could say that he, he knew his plant material. Design-wise, I don't think, he was not that talented. But he was pretty knowledgeable as to what types of plants would do well in certain, given areas. Whether it'd be southern exposure, northern exposure, western exposure, eastern exposure, the types of soil. He's pretty knowledgeable about that type of thing. So, he was able to plant the proper plants in the right locations that were suitable for, for that particular plant. Design-wise, I don't think he was too talented in that, that aspect.

RP: Did he design pond gardens, waterfall features, that type of thing?

HN: Yeah, when the call came for that type of thing, he liked to do that, rock gardens or the Oriental type gardens.

RP: There was... those became very trendy in the '20s and 30s.

HN: At one time, yeah.

RP: Uh-huh. How was his ability to work with rocks? Did he, did he have an eye for selecting rocks or, or was that...

HN: Well he liked to do that. But I say that he was, he didn't have a real good eye for it. 'Cause I was kinda critical about things like that. [Laughs] About, about placement of rocks. Just because of, not by doing it, but visually seeing the other works that were, what I thought were, were nice. And learning from visually seeing. And then also studying natural nature. I think that was the important thing about doing rock work is, is having a visual, have the natural look to rock placement and not something that was, it was put there that had that unnatural look.

RP: Just dumped out on...

HN: Yeah, yeah.

RP: So did you work with him at all on any of his landscape projects?

HN: No, no. I didn't have a chance. By the time I got involved in the landscape business, he was like mostly retired and, and, and after I got, really got involved in, in doing landscaping, my father was gone. So...