Design and Feminism: Re-Visioning Spaces, Places, and Everyday Things by Joan Rothschild (editor)

Author:Joan Rothschild (editor) [Rothschild, Joan]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Architecture, Criticism, Design; Drafting; Drawing & Presentation, Design, General, Social Science, Feminism & Feminist Theory
ISBN: 9780813526676
Google: 8l7VD1woFLQC
Publisher: Rutgers University Press
Published: 1999-02-15T06:00:00+00:00

Fig. 6.3. Plan of the Villa Lewaro (by Etain Fitzpatrick after Carson A. Anderson, The Architectural Practice of Vertner W. Tandy)

Fig. 6.4. Madam Walker driving (Walker Collection, Indiana Historical Society)

There was separate accommodation for the chauffeur and gardener in a free-standing garage, and also room for Madam Walker's four cars. Madam C. J. Walker was herself a driver (fig. 6.4), which was not usual for women at the time. To her authority in the boardroom, where she dealt with two traditionally male preserves, finance and technical knowledge and processes, she added power behind the wheel. Both figuratively and literally, she could drive herself when and where she chose to. When she turned her attention to her own house, she focused on creating an image of which she and her associates could be proud, on providing accommodation for her close relationship with her daughter, and on making the most modern conveniences available to those people who worked for her in her home.

My second example is a house in Pasadena, California (fig. 6.5), designed in 1954 by Richard Neutra for Constance Perkins, a professor at Occidental College." Perkins was also single and the head of her own household, although she was at a very different economic level from Madam C. J. Walker. An art historian, Professor Perkins was drawn to Neutra's work through her interest in modern European architecture of the 1920s and 1930s, and she frequently took her architecture students to visit Neutra's home and studio in nearby Silver Lake. It was during a lecture by Neutra at Occidental that Perkins challenged the architect to come up with a design for a small house which she could afford and which would accommodate the way in which she wanted to live.

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