Elizabeth Cadbury-Brown (born Elizabeth Romeyn Elwyn; 28 March 1922 – 17 March 2002) was an American-born

architect An architect is a person who plans, designs and oversees the construction of buildings. To practice architecture means to provide services in connection with the design of buildings and the space within the site surrounding the buildings that h ...

. She moved to London in 1948 and from then on worked mostly with

H. T. Cadbury-Brown Henry Thomas Cadbury-Brown RA (20 May 1913 – 9 July 2009) was an English architect. He was educated at the Architecture Association where he was influenced by the architecture of Le Corbusier and Walter Gropius. After graduating he worked fo ...

, her husband and professional partner.

Early life

Elizabeth Elwyn was born in 1922 in

Manhattan Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the original counties of the U.S. state ...

, New York. Her father, Adolf Elwyn, was a neuro-anatomy professor at

Columbia University Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...

, and her mother was a social and environmental activist. She was raised in Croton-on-Hudson, New York, and attended Hessian Hills School. She studied English briefly at Columbia but transferred to a degree in architecture after a year.

Career

Cadbury-Brown worked in a New York practice until 1948, when she decided to visit Europe. While in London she met Bill Dale, a lawyer whom she would later marry, and decided to stay and work there. Although she was told by the Royal Institute of British Architects that she would have difficulty finding work in London as an American with little experience, she found an unpaid position at the practice of Ernő Goldfinger. She began working for

in 1949, assisting him on plans for the

Festival of Britain The Festival of Britain was a national exhibition and fair that reached millions of visitors throughout the United Kingdom in the summer of 1951. Historian Kenneth O. Morgan says the Festival was a "triumphant success" during which people: ...

which would be held in 1951. They married and later went into practice together. Together, the Cadbury-Browns collaborated on a number of projects. At the new buildings for the

Royal College of Art The Royal College of Art (RCA) is a public research university in London, United Kingdom, with campuses in South Kensington, Battersea and White City. It is the only entirely postgraduate art and design university in the United Kingdom. It offe ...

Kensington Gore Kensington Gore is the name of a U-shaped thoroughfare on the south side of Hyde Park in central London, England. The streets connect the Royal Albert Hall with the Royal College of Art, the Royal Geographical Society, and in Kensington Garde ...

, London, designed by H. T. Cadbury-Brown with

Hugh Casson Sir Hugh Maxwell Casson (23 May 1910 – 15 August 1999) was a British architect. He was also active as an interior designer, as an artist, and as a writer and broadcaster on twentieth-century design. He was the director of architecture for t ...

and Robert Goodden and built between 1960 and 1963, Elizabeth was assistant architect for Gulbenkian Hall, where her influence is clearly visible. The couple also worked together on Gravesend Civic Centre in

Gravesend Gravesend is a town in northwest Kent, England, situated 21 miles (35 km) east-southeast of Charing Cross (central London) on the Bank (geography), south bank of the River Thames and opposite Tilbury in Essex. Located in the diocese of Ro ...

; on a controversial

council housing Public housing in the United Kingdom, also known as council estates, council housing, or social housing, provided the majority of rented accommodation until 2011 when the number of households in private rental housing surpassed the number in so ...

project at

World's End World's End or Worlds End may refer to: Arts and entertainment Literature Novels * ''World's End'' (Boyle novel), a 1987 novel by T. Coraghessan Boyle * ''World's End'' (Chadbourn novel), a 2000 novel by Mark Chadbourn * ''World's End'' (Sincl ...

, Chelsea, from 1963; on the hexagonal lecture theatres for the University of Essex in 1965–1967; on the library and print room of the

Royal Academy of Arts The Royal Academy of Arts (RA) is an art institution based in Burlington House on Piccadilly in London. Founded in 1768, it has a unique position as an independent, privately funded institution led by eminent artists and architects. Its purpo ...

Burlington House Burlington House is a building on Piccadilly in Mayfair, London. It was originally a private Neo-Palladian mansion owned by the Earls of Burlington and was expanded in the mid-19th century after being purchased by the British government. Toda ...

Piccadilly Piccadilly () is a road in the City of Westminster, London, to the south of Mayfair, between Hyde Park Corner in the west and Piccadilly Circus in the east. It is part of the A4 road that connects central London to Hammersmith, Earl's Court, ...

from 1985 to 1987; and on the Cadbury-Browns' own home in

Aldeburgh Aldeburgh ( ) is a coastal town in the English county, county of Suffolk, England. Located to the north of the River Alde. Its estimated population was 2,276 in 2019. It was home to the composer Benjamin Britten and remains the centre of the int ...

, Suffolk.

National Life Stories National Life Stories is an independent charitable trust and limited company (registered as the ‘National Life Story Collection’) based within the British Library Oral History section, whose key focus and expertise is oral history fieldwork. S ...

conducted an oral history interview (C467/55) with Betty Cardbury-Brown in 1998 for its Architects Lives' collection held by the British Library.National Life Stories, 'Cadbury-Brown, Betty (1 of 13) National Life Stories Collection: Architects' Lives', The British Library Board, 1997
Retrieved 10 April 2018

Personal life

Cadbury-Brown married English lawyer William Dale in 1949. She divorced Dale and remarried H. T. Cadbury-Brown in 1953. Her first marriage ended amicably and she remained close friends with Dale. She died in Aldeburgh in 2002.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Cadbury-Brown, Elizabeth 1922 births 2002 deaths People from Manhattan Architects from New York (state) 20th-century American architects 20th-century English architects American women architects British women architects Columbia Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation alumni American emigrants to England 20th-century American women