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WOMEN ARCHITECTS! WHY NOT?
Why are there not more women
architects, asks Tasmania's
only woman architect, who tomor-
row leaves the State.
Miss Margaret Keitha Findlay ls
qualified to ask this question. She
was trained in Hobart, and is a regis-
tered architect and an associate of the
Royal Australian Institute of Archi
tects. She is a member of the insti-
tute's Tasmanian council, which she re-
cently represented at an interstate
conference on architectural education.
There she was pleased to find that the
Victorian representative also was a
woman-Miss E. Harvle.
After designing many of the resi-
dences in the "townsite" of Australian
Newsprint Mills Pty. Ltd., at New Nor-
folk, and serving in the architectural
branch of the Public Works Dept., Ho-
bart, Miss Findlay has been appoint-
ed instructor in architectural drafts-
manship at the University of Sydney.
MISS KEITHA FINDLAY Help
MISS KEITHA FINDLAY
Tasmania's only woman architect.
She has been working for the revision
of the architectural diploma course of
the technical college, and is keenly in-
terested in providing the best educa-
tion for the suitable type of architec-
tural student in Tasmania.
"What ls the right type of student? ,
Is lt just one who can draw a house?
It is amazing," said Miss Findlay,
"how many people would answer 'Yes,'
and be quite wrong. Drawing is the
architect's means of expressing on paper
what is in his mind. Apart from
artistic appearance, without and within,
and whether the subject is a hospital,
a school, a factory, a residence, the
architect has had to consider the pur-
pose of the building, the exact duties
of the future occupant, and how these
things will be carried out in the best
way, in a minimum of time, and with
least labour. Also he will have had
to calculate strengths of columns,
beams, and so forth to apportion the
space to maximum advantage, and ar-
range the equipment in the best way.
"The nurse in a hospital wing, and
the housewife in her kitchen can be sav-
ed hundreds of miles of steps in a
year by modern arrangement. Yes,
there is a lot more than drawing to be
done," added Miss Findlay.
"So the architect stands between the
artist and the engineer, and must com-
bine some qualities of both, together
with capacity to handle men, materials,
and business affairs. Hence the right
type of student must be both artistic
and practical, and does not life demand
just these things of women?" asked
Miss Findlay.
The students' education should early
be directed toward attaining the essen-
tial leaving pass; including mathe-
matics, with physics, and English, apart
from general culture.
The student enters the office of an
architect, she said, and undertakes the
architectural diploma course of the
Technical College, attending evening
classes. By arrangement, students could
sit in Hobart for the examinations of
the Sydney Technical College. That
college had now a five years' course
which qualified them to become associ-
ates of the Royal Australian Institute
of Architects, and to be enrolled as a
registered architect, under Tasmanian
law.
Commonwealth and State building
programmes and private firms would
need a great many architects; even be-
fore the war there was a shortage, Miss
Findlay said. Never was there such an
opportunity for girls to take up archi-
tecture, and this was their chance to
show the profession and the public
what they could do.
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