The landscape of the new International Flight Training Academy (IFTA), built by Obayashi America Corporation for All Nippon Airways was designed to provide visiting Japanese students a self-sufficient and secure haven where they could live, study, and play while training for the commercial pilot's designation, a two-year program. The location of the facility adjacent to the municipal airport outside of downtown Bakersfield, California, influenced the seminal design concept.

Calvin Abe of Los Angeles, the Japanese-American Landscape Architect who developed the conceptual landscape master plan for the project, created a dual landscape for the campus-one which recalls both Japan and California. "The intent of the landscape concept was to create a unique environment which responded to the regional climate, architectural character (the buildings were designed by The Nadel Partnership), and academic program, while symbolically representing the Japanese homeland and the California context," said Abe.

In one direction, the wavy lines of the topography between the administration-classroom building and the athletic courts, planted with pine trees and California native grasses, echo the agricultural character of the surrounding region.

In the other direction, a round area to the rear of the dormitory planted with ginkgoes provides a shaded grove, while a red circular area at the center of the project-recalling the rising sun of the Japanese flag-functions as a cul-de-sac for limited drop-off and delivery and as the place for celebrating the annual summer Obon. At this traditional Japanese dance festival, students and guests dress in decorative hapi or kimono, sing songs recalling farming and daily life, and dance to the beat of Taiko drummers.

Within this composition of spaces, environments, and forms, the landscape images not only define, but join the two cultures. A blue concrete walk, flanked on one side by a double row of cypress trees, cuts through the 7-acre campus. The line of demarcation between the Japanese and California landscapes to either side, it also links the recreation area and Junior Olympic swimming pool within (where IFTA hopes to host visiting teams) with the public street outside. Appropriately, this image which divides the two cultures, ultimately provides the connection between them. LASN