Florence Mary Taylor
Encyclopedia
Florence Mary Taylor CBE
(née Parsons) (29 December 1879, Bedminster, England
- 13 February 1969, Sydney, Australia
) was the first qualified female architect
and the first woman to train as an engineer
in Australia
. She was also the first woman in Australia to fly in a heavier-than-air craft in 1909. However she is best known for her role as publisher, editor
and writer
for the influential building industry trade journal
s established in 1907 with her husband
George, which she ran and expanded after his death in 1928 until her retirement in 1961.
), England
to working class parents who described themselves as "stone quarryman" and "washerwoman" in the British census of 1881. Her family migrated to Australia when she was a child, arriving in Sydney, New South Wales
in 1884 after a short stint in Queensland
. Her father John Parsons soon found work as a draftsman
-clerk with the Parramatta
Council. According to her official although unpublished biography by Kerwin Maegraith, Florence attended a nearby public school where she says she received a "good education".Although in high school, she attended PLC sydney,class of 1896.
in 1896 and father in 1899, Florence was forced to find work to help support herself and her two younger sisters. She eventually found a position as a clerk in the Parramatta architectural practice of Francis Ernest Stowe, an acquaintance of her father's. Inspired by the example of draftsperson
in the same office who were earning far more than herself, she enrolled in night classes at the Sydney Technical College
where she became the first woman to complete final year studies in architecture in 1904.
During her architecture course she was articled
to the architect Edmund Skelton Garton. Although she had fond memories of being mentored by Garton, she later recalled that other workers in the office were less encouraging. Soon after completing her articles, she went on to work in the busy and prestigious office of John Burcham Clamp, where she claimed she was made chief draftsperson.
With Clamp's strong support in 1907, Florence applied to become the first women member of the Institute of Architects of New South Wales. However she was not accepted at this time, and she later claimed to have been "blackballed" by a groundswell of hostility from the all-male membership who did not wish to admit a woman member. She did become the first woman member of the Institute, but not until 1920 when she accepted their invitation to join.
In April 1907, Florence married George Augustine Taylor
, at St Stephen's Presbyterian Church in Sydney. George Taylor had lectured her at college and was a close friend of her first employer F.E. Stowe. On 5 December 1909, Florence became the first Australian woman to fly a heavier-than-air craft, in a glider
built by George, from the Narrabeen
sandhills
near Sydney. They were both passionate about architecture and town planning, amongst many other interests and activities. Max Freeland described them as "possibly the most amazing couple in Australia's history".
Within a few months of their wedding they had established a publishing company that specialised in building industry journals, spearheaded by "Building" magazine. In 1914 Florence helped George to found the Town Planning Association of New South Wales. Florences secretary was Mary Emily Haworth (1901–1998) (maternal grandmother of Australian artist Kathy Panton 1969-). Journalist John Canner (1882–1978) also worked on "Building Ltd" where he met and later married Mary Haworth.
Following her husband's sudden death, drowning
in his bath associated with an epileptic fit in 1928, Florence maintained their publishing
business and continued to produce town plans. She also travelled to Asia
and Europe
. She published a book about her town plans in 1959, authored by her employee J.M. Giles, 50 years of town planning with Florence M. Taylor. Florence was appointed an Officer of the Order of the British Empire in 1939 and elevated to a Commander
of that order in 1961.
. She died there on 13 February 1969 and was cremated with Anglican rites. Her estate was valued for probate at $226,281.
Taylor's legacy as a town planner is probably more extensive, although indirect. Throughout her career she produced town planning schemes which were published in her journals and presented to government authorities but otherwise apparently ignored. Yet many of the ideas she advocated for Sydney have come to fruition in recent decades including a harbour tunnel crossing, an eastern suburbs distributor freeway, the construction of "double-decker streets" such as the Victoria Street overpass across William Street at Kings Cross, increased building of apartments especially in harbourside localities such as Woolloomooloo and North Sydney, more flexible mixed-use zoning (including longer shopping hours), making Sydney more attractive for tourism and the need to conserve and plant more trees everywhere. Other ideas have proved unpopular or incorrect, such as her desire to demolish Hyde Park Barracks or build heliports in the CBD and her contention that the Sydney Opera House would be a white elephant.
The Canberra
suburb Taylor
was named in her honour, as were several professional awards, including the 'Florence M. Taylor Medallion' from the Master Builders Association of Victoria
and the 'Florence Taylor Award' from the Queensland
chapter of the Australian Institute of Building.
A three-storey high portrait of Florence Taylor adorns an apartment building facing the railway on the southern approach to Sydney's Central railway station, which commemorates her as "Australia's first woman architect". Although this portrait also features a photograph of the beautiful Gothic Mortuary Station, located nearby, that building was completed ten years before Taylor's birth, designed by the then Government Architect James Barnet, and there is no known link between Taylor and the building.
A portrait of Florence Taylor by Jerrold Nathan is held by the Mitchell Library
, Sydney.
Order of the British Empire
The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is an order of chivalry established on 4 June 1917 by George V of the United Kingdom. The Order comprises five classes in civil and military divisions...
(née Parsons) (29 December 1879, Bedminster, England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
- 13 February 1969, Sydney, Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
) was the first qualified female architect
Architect
An architect is a person trained in the planning, design and oversight of the construction of buildings. To practice architecture means to offer or render services in connection with the design and construction of a building, or group of buildings and the space within the site surrounding the...
and the first woman to train as an engineer
Engineer
An engineer is a professional practitioner of engineering, concerned with applying scientific knowledge, mathematics and ingenuity to develop solutions for technical problems. Engineers design materials, structures, machines and systems while considering the limitations imposed by practicality,...
in Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
. She was also the first woman in Australia to fly in a heavier-than-air craft in 1909. However she is best known for her role as publisher, editor
Editing
Editing is the process of selecting and preparing written, visual, audible, and film media used to convey information through the processes of correction, condensation, organization, and other modifications performed with an intention of producing a correct, consistent, accurate, and complete...
and writer
Writer
A writer is a person who produces literature, such as novels, short stories, plays, screenplays, poetry, or other literary art. Skilled writers are able to use language to portray ideas and images....
for the influential building industry trade journal
Trade journal
A trade magazine, also called a professional magazine, is a magazine published with the intention of target marketing to a specific industry or type of trade. The collective term for this area of publishing is the trade press....
s established in 1907 with her husband
Husband
A husband is a male participant in a marriage. The rights and obligations of the husband regarding his spouse and others, and his status in the community and in law, vary between cultures and has varied over time...
George, which she ran and expanded after his death in 1928 until her retirement in 1961.
Early life
Florence was born at Bedminster, in Somerset (now BristolBristol
Bristol is a city, unitary authority area and ceremonial county in South West England, with an estimated population of 433,100 for the unitary authority in 2009, and a surrounding Larger Urban Zone with an estimated 1,070,000 residents in 2007...
), England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
to working class parents who described themselves as "stone quarryman" and "washerwoman" in the British census of 1881. Her family migrated to Australia when she was a child, arriving in Sydney, New South Wales
New South Wales
New South Wales is a state of :Australia, located in the east of the country. It is bordered by Queensland, Victoria and South Australia to the north, south and west respectively. To the east, the state is bordered by the Tasman Sea, which forms part of the Pacific Ocean. New South Wales...
in 1884 after a short stint in Queensland
Queensland
Queensland is a state of Australia, occupying the north-eastern section of the mainland continent. It is bordered by the Northern Territory, South Australia and New South Wales to the west, south-west and south respectively. To the east, Queensland is bordered by the Coral Sea and Pacific Ocean...
. Her father John Parsons soon found work as a draftsman
Technical drawing
Technical drawing, also known as drafting or draughting, is the act and discipline of composing plans that visually communicate how something functions or has to be constructed.Drafting is the language of industry....
-clerk with the Parramatta
Parramatta, New South Wales
Parramatta is a suburb of Sydney, in the state of New South Wales, Australia. It is located in Greater Western Sydney west of the Sydney central business district on the banks of the Parramatta River. Parramatta is the administrative seat of the Local Government Area of the City of Parramatta...
Council. According to her official although unpublished biography by Kerwin Maegraith, Florence attended a nearby public school where she says she received a "good education".Although in high school, she attended PLC sydney,class of 1896.
Career
Following the deaths of her motherMother
A mother, mum, mom, momma, or mama is a woman who has raised a child, given birth to a child, and/or supplied the ovum that grew into a child. Because of the complexity and differences of a mother's social, cultural, and religious definitions and roles, it is challenging to specify a universally...
in 1896 and father in 1899, Florence was forced to find work to help support herself and her two younger sisters. She eventually found a position as a clerk in the Parramatta architectural practice of Francis Ernest Stowe, an acquaintance of her father's. Inspired by the example of draftsperson
Technical drawing
Technical drawing, also known as drafting or draughting, is the act and discipline of composing plans that visually communicate how something functions or has to be constructed.Drafting is the language of industry....
in the same office who were earning far more than herself, she enrolled in night classes at the Sydney Technical College
Sydney Technical College
The Sydney Technical College was a name used by Australia's oldest technical education institution.It began as the Sydney Mechanics' Institute in 1843...
where she became the first woman to complete final year studies in architecture in 1904.
During her architecture course she was articled
Articled clerk
An articled clerk, also known as an articling student, is an apprentice in a professional firm in Commonwealth countries. Generally the term arises in the accountancy profession and in the legal profession. The articled clerk signs a contract, known as "articles of clerkship", committing to a...
to the architect Edmund Skelton Garton. Although she had fond memories of being mentored by Garton, she later recalled that other workers in the office were less encouraging. Soon after completing her articles, she went on to work in the busy and prestigious office of John Burcham Clamp, where she claimed she was made chief draftsperson.
With Clamp's strong support in 1907, Florence applied to become the first women member of the Institute of Architects of New South Wales. However she was not accepted at this time, and she later claimed to have been "blackballed" by a groundswell of hostility from the all-male membership who did not wish to admit a woman member. She did become the first woman member of the Institute, but not until 1920 when she accepted their invitation to join.
In April 1907, Florence married George Augustine Taylor
George Augustine Taylor
George Augustine Taylor was an Australian artist, journalist, and inventor.- Life :Taylor was born at Sydney in 1872. He first became known as an artist, and was a member of the Sydney Bohemian set in the 1890s, whose doings he was afterwards to record in his Those Were the Days, a volume of...
, at St Stephen's Presbyterian Church in Sydney. George Taylor had lectured her at college and was a close friend of her first employer F.E. Stowe. On 5 December 1909, Florence became the first Australian woman to fly a heavier-than-air craft, in a glider
Glider aircraft
Glider aircraft are heavier-than-air craft that are supported in flight by the dynamic reaction of the air against their lifting surfaces, and whose free flight does not depend on an engine. Mostly these types of aircraft are intended for routine operation without engines, though engine failure can...
built by George, from the Narrabeen
Narrabeen, New South Wales
Narrabeen is a beachside suburb in northern Sydney, in the state of New South Wales, Australia. Narrabeen is located 23 kilometres north-east of the Sydney central business district, in the local government area of Warringah Council and is part of the Northern Beaches region.-History:There are a...
sandhills
Sandhills
Sandhills could be:* SandhillUSA*Sand Hills , Coconino County, Arizona*Sand Hills , Yuba County, California*Sandhills , a region in North and South Carolina*Sand Hills , Bonneville County, Idaho...
near Sydney. They were both passionate about architecture and town planning, amongst many other interests and activities. Max Freeland described them as "possibly the most amazing couple in Australia's history".
Within a few months of their wedding they had established a publishing company that specialised in building industry journals, spearheaded by "Building" magazine. In 1914 Florence helped George to found the Town Planning Association of New South Wales. Florences secretary was Mary Emily Haworth (1901–1998) (maternal grandmother of Australian artist Kathy Panton 1969-). Journalist John Canner (1882–1978) also worked on "Building Ltd" where he met and later married Mary Haworth.
Following her husband's sudden death, drowning
Drowning
Drowning is death from asphyxia due to suffocation caused by water entering the lungs and preventing the absorption of oxygen leading to cerebral hypoxia....
in his bath associated with an epileptic fit in 1928, Florence maintained their publishing
Publishing
Publishing is the process of production and dissemination of literature or information—the activity of making information available to the general public...
business and continued to produce town plans. She also travelled to Asia
Asia
Asia is the world's largest and most populous continent, located primarily in the eastern and northern hemispheres. It covers 8.7% of the Earth's total surface area and with approximately 3.879 billion people, it hosts 60% of the world's current human population...
and Europe
Europe
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...
. She published a book about her town plans in 1959, authored by her employee J.M. Giles, 50 years of town planning with Florence M. Taylor. Florence was appointed an Officer of the Order of the British Empire in 1939 and elevated to a Commander
Order of the British Empire
The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is an order of chivalry established on 4 June 1917 by George V of the United Kingdom. The Order comprises five classes in civil and military divisions...
of that order in 1961.
Retirement and death
Florence Taylor retired in 1961 at 81 years of age, and lived in Potts PointPotts Point, New South Wales
Potts Point is a small, densely-populated suburb of inner-city Sydney, in the state of New South Wales, Australia. Potts Point is located 3 kilometres east of the Sydney central business district and is part of the local government area of the City of Sydney....
. She died there on 13 February 1969 and was cremated with Anglican rites. Her estate was valued for probate at $226,281.
Legacy
In some of the many interviews where she told her life story, Florence Taylor suggested that she had designed up to 100 houses in Sydney during her stint as an architect between 1900 and 1907. Although she left no easy records specifying where these were located, some aspects of her design work have now been documented. In 1907 she worked with her employer John Burcham Clamp on the basement of the Farmers Department store in Pitt Street Sydney, perhaps the first example of a woman contributing to commercial architectural design in Sydney. Also in 1907 she provided a perspective drawing for the winning competition entry for the Commercial Traveller's Building in Sydney (which was demolished to make way for the MLC Centre in the 1970s). Again in 1907 she won prizes in several architectural design sections of the "First Australian Exhibition of Women's Work" in Melbourne in 1907. Her winning design for a kitchen was published in the NSW Institute of Architects' journal in November 1907 (accompanied by a somewhat condescending commentary). Her second prize winning design for a seaside cottage had to wait another 50 years before being published in one of her own journals, "Construction", on 24 December 1958. Further research has uncovered houses probably designed by Florence Taylor at 12 Florence Street Cremorne, Hogue House in Kareela Road Cremorne and a house built in the 1920s for her sister Annis in Thomas Street Roseville.Taylor's legacy as a town planner is probably more extensive, although indirect. Throughout her career she produced town planning schemes which were published in her journals and presented to government authorities but otherwise apparently ignored. Yet many of the ideas she advocated for Sydney have come to fruition in recent decades including a harbour tunnel crossing, an eastern suburbs distributor freeway, the construction of "double-decker streets" such as the Victoria Street overpass across William Street at Kings Cross, increased building of apartments especially in harbourside localities such as Woolloomooloo and North Sydney, more flexible mixed-use zoning (including longer shopping hours), making Sydney more attractive for tourism and the need to conserve and plant more trees everywhere. Other ideas have proved unpopular or incorrect, such as her desire to demolish Hyde Park Barracks or build heliports in the CBD and her contention that the Sydney Opera House would be a white elephant.
The Canberra
Canberra
Canberra is the capital city of Australia. With a population of over 345,000, it is Australia's largest inland city and the eighth-largest city overall. The city is located at the northern end of the Australian Capital Territory , south-west of Sydney, and north-east of Melbourne...
suburb Taylor
Taylor, Australian Capital Territory
Taylor is a designated suburb in Gungahlin, Canberra though the first land release is yet to be announced. The suburb is named after magazine publisher Florence Taylor OBE, who was editor of and writer for several Australian building industry journals including the influential 'Building' magazine...
was named in her honour, as were several professional awards, including the 'Florence M. Taylor Medallion' from the Master Builders Association of Victoria
Victoria (Australia)
Victoria is the second most populous state in Australia. Geographically the smallest mainland state, Victoria is bordered by New South Wales, South Australia, and Tasmania on Boundary Islet to the north, west and south respectively....
and the 'Florence Taylor Award' from the Queensland
Queensland
Queensland is a state of Australia, occupying the north-eastern section of the mainland continent. It is bordered by the Northern Territory, South Australia and New South Wales to the west, south-west and south respectively. To the east, Queensland is bordered by the Coral Sea and Pacific Ocean...
chapter of the Australian Institute of Building.
A three-storey high portrait of Florence Taylor adorns an apartment building facing the railway on the southern approach to Sydney's Central railway station, which commemorates her as "Australia's first woman architect". Although this portrait also features a photograph of the beautiful Gothic Mortuary Station, located nearby, that building was completed ten years before Taylor's birth, designed by the then Government Architect James Barnet, and there is no known link between Taylor and the building.
A portrait of Florence Taylor by Jerrold Nathan is held by the Mitchell Library
Mitchell Library
The Mitchell Library is a large public library and centre of the public library system of Glasgow, Scotland.-History:The library was established with a bequest from Stephen Mitchell, a wealthy tobacco manufacturer, whose company, Stephen Mitchell & Son, would become one of the constituent members...
, Sydney.