Arata Endo encouraged promising young architects to visit Wright in Wisconsin if they were journeying to America. Takehiko Okami, who had worked for Arata from 1925-28, arrived at Taliesin in 1929.

Wright and his wife Olgivanna were then planning to incorporate the Taliesin Fellowship, a combination of medieval craft guild and agrarian kibbutz. Okami assisted them by cataloguing Wright's built and unbuilt work, the first to do so. He also took dozens of photographs, including some that Wright considered too private to publish — which later caused a rift between the two.