Mr. Takai

Who is Mr. Takai?

              Yoshikazu Takai is the president of the design company Kyodo Creation. His works include of picture book designs and characters.

Why did he decide to be the designer of picture books?

              When he was a university student, he went to the primary school for teaching practice. Actually, he thought he wants to be a teacher, but if he became a teacher, he would teach a lot of things- not only Art. Therefore, he could have a dream that he wants to tell children various things through creating picture books. It took 20 years for his dream to come true. To do it, he wrote more than 100 picture books.

Do you have any work that influenced you to become a picture book writer?

              Tezuka Osamu inspired him. He is like god to Mr. Takai. He was interested in SF, so he read “Tetsuwan Atomu,” when he was a primary school student. Also, he loves “Kaizyu,” so he watched “Ultraman Q.”