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JUST try to coax Ruth Shellhorn into talking about that photograph of her at the White House more than 30 years ago, accepting an award from Pat Nixon. What was the award?

"I don't know," Shellhorn says.

At 95, it's understandable that a few details from a career spanning seven decades might grow fuzzy. But spend more time with Shellhorn – one of the designers credited with shaping two quintessentially Californian places, the shopping mall and Disneyland – and it's clear that modesty, not failed memory, is at play.

She really just wants to talk about the work. Shellhorn ushers visitors to the drawing board in her Redondo Beach home office and is soon awash in blueprints. As she unrolls yellowing, 50-year-old plans for a new amusement park called Disneyland, she remembers choosing elm trees for Main Street USA because they're vertical and space saving. She flips through old photographs and describes how she softened the look of blocky department store buildings with lacy espaliers.

"I miss it a lot," says Shellhorn. "It was my recreation."

It also was a legendary career, says Los Angeles landscape architect Kelly Comras, who co-wrote a profile of Shellhorn for the second volume of "Pioneers of American Landscape Design," to be published next year by McGraw-Hill. Comras also will deliver a public lecture on Shellhorn's work in October at UCLA.
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