A Woman to Know: Fanny Wilkinson
I was always fond of gardening as a child, and I took it up because I felt it suited me. — Fanny Wilkinson
I was always fond of gardening as a child, and I took it up because I felt it suited me. — Fanny Wilkinson
(image via Wikimedia Commons)
Tour London’s parks and gardens and you’re likely touring some of Fanny Wilkinson’s work; throughout the 19th century, she designed more than 75 green spaces for the city, making her the first known female landscape designer to work in the United Kingdom.
Fanny grew up in Manchester but spent extended stays at her family residence, Middlethorpe Hall, in north Yorkshire. The grounds inspired her in her landscape architecture journey. Her family asked her to drop gardening and take up a more suitable activity — i.e., finding a husband — but instead of going on dates, Fanny instead decided to turn her love of green things into a career.
In 1883, when she was 28 years old, she studied landscape architecture in an 18-month-long course at the Crystal Palace. In an interview with the Women’s Penny Paper, Fanny described her entrance into the male-dominated industry:
Fanny Wilkinson made it clear that her admittance to the Crystal Palace classes, which were intended only for men, had been fraught with difficulty. Domestic gardening had long been considered a womanly pursuit; running a business that involved design, hard landscaping, dealing with horticultural suppliers, supervising the work of male gardeners, and keeping abreast with the accounts was not.
Once she completed the course, she joined a group of designers, the Kyrle Society, charged with beautifying public green spaces in impoverished neighborhoods. Fanny had experience with the Metropolitan Parks Association in London, but too often their works focused on prettying up existing spaces in chi-chi parts of town. Fanny wanted to bring gardens to the masses.
As part of her work with the Kyrle Society, Fanny designed an eight-acre park, Vauxhall — a gorgeously landscaped garden that ultimately took 19 years to complete. She spent a considerable amount of time negotiating her salary, telling one reporter that “I certainly do not let myself be underpaid as many women do.”
With the grand opening of Vauxhall Park, Fanny’s work increased greatly. Her new high-profile designs included churchyards, private gardens, neat and tiny town squares and sprawling estates.
In 1904, she took charge of the Swanley Horticultural College, transforming the formerly all-male institute into an all-female school, soon known as a training ground for accomplished landscape architects. As Fanny famously told her students:
There are people who write to me because I am a woman, and think I will ask less than a man. That I will never do. I know my profession and charge accordingly, as all women should do.
Though she formally retired in 1916, Fanny remained an active part of the landscape architecture community. She continued to teach and took up a new hobby: breeding goats on her Suffolk farm. In 1951, she passed away — still unmarried — at the age of 95.
Add to your library list:
London Parks and Gardens (Alicia Amherst)
London’s Green Walks (David Hampshire)
Read more:
Fanny Rollo Wilkinson (Oxford Dictionary of National Biography)
The work of Fanny Wilkinson (Parks & Gardens)
Women in Gardening (Gardens Illustrated)
Women’s contributions to green spaces (The Evening Standard)
Watch more:
Fanny Wilkinson, pioneer designer of public parks (Landscape Architecture)
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