Here’s a fun fact: Oakland was the first company in Columbus to design and build interior plant installations. It was the early 1980s and large Class-A office buildings were going up around the 270 outerbelt. These buildings had large, multi-story, interior atriums that needed to be filled with tropical plants: enter Oakand Interiorscapes!
The first large-scale, commerical indoor landscape was at the Holiday Inn on Steltzer Rd., now a Days Inn. It was built in the waning years of the “Holidome” design period, when Holiday Inn was creating indoor recreation areas for travelers. As a new phenomenon in Ohio, Oakland’s owner, John Reiner, made trips to Homestead, Florida to handpick giant palms and other plants for installations like the Holiday Inn, Crosswoods, Sunbury Woods, and 1105 Shrock Road. This was in the early days, before there were plant brokers and before we even knew what plants would do well indoors.
Do you remember the early days of Embassy Suites? Each hotel lobby was composed of an atrium filled will plants, water features, walkways, little bridges, and some even had birds! Sadly, most Embassy Suites have been renovated to remove much of the flora that made them such a fun stay.
The Embassy Suites at Corporate Exchange on 161 was under contstruction in 1984. Oakland was contracted to design and install the plants, and on the appointed date, a semitruck load of plants was brought up to Ohio from Florida. Unfortunately, it was the middle of the winter, and like all good construction projects, things were delayed and the plants couldn’t be installed on arrival. With temps hovering around freezing and no place large enough to store them, the Oakland team moved them all into the unfilled, lower-level pool, covered it with plastic, and brought in kerosene heaters to create an artificial greenhouse. They were able to keep the plants alive until the site was finally ready for them.
(Image below of said pool as it looked in the early years.)
Since those early days, Oakland and the Oakland Interiorscapes/Oakland Green Interiors team has tackled all sorts of projects, from the new plant rooms at the Franklin Park Conservatory (1992) to offices and restaurants across Columbus. Stay tuned for more stories and retro photos as we dig through the archives and share the ways we’ve helped shape interior plant design in our community!
