Brenda Colvin was one of the pioneers of the modern landscape profession in Britain. In 1922 she founded her own practice which until the Second World War was concerned with the creation and improvement of private gardens whose design, particularly in the planting, was often well ahead of the fashions of the time. In 1929 she was one of a small group who founded the Institute of Landscape Architects, now the Landscape Institute, and in 1957 became the first woman to be president of any of the design professions.
After the war she was a leader in the new professional field of designing industrial landscapes around the new generation of power stations and reservoirs, and in promoting landscape design as an inseparable part of industrial and urban projects. Her book "Land and Landscape" (1947) and her lectures were a major influence on many architects and landscape architects of the following generation, and "Trees for Town and Country" remains a classic handbook.
Having practised from a London office for most of her working life, she moved the office to Filkins in 1965 and when Hal Moggridge joined her as partner in 1969 the firm took its present title.
Her own garden, maintained by Colvin and Moggridge whose offices are set within it, is probably the best preserved example of her work. Among its rich contents is the original plant of the rambler rose ‘Brenda Colvin’, still growing where a chance seedling sprang up in 1965; it was later named by Graham Stuart Thomas and is offered by one or two nurseries.
The practice today still consciously embodies the passion, dedication and rigour, which she brought to her work and instilled in those around her. |
