Judith Ledeboer

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Judith Geertruid Ledeboer
Born(1901-09-08)8 September 1901
Almelo, Netherlands
Died24 December 1990(1990-12-24) (aged 89)
Surrey, United Kingdom
NationalityDutch-British
Known forArchitecture
AwardsOfficer of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (OBE) (1966)

Judith Geertruid Ledeboer

OBE
(8 September 1901 – 24 December 1990) was a Dutch-born English architect. She was most active in London and Oxford, where she designed a variety of schools, university buildings and public housing projects.

Early life and education

Ledeboer was born in 1901 in

Bedford College (a constituent school of the University of London). She studied history at Newnham College at the University of Cambridge from 1921 to 1924. She moved to Cambridge, Massachusetts, to complete a master's degree in economics at Radcliffe College in 1925, and returned to London the next year to train at the Architectural Association School of Architecture. She studied alongside Jessica Albery, Justin Blanco White, and Mary Crowley (later Medd), and they developed a commitment to housing reform and social concerns which impacted their future careers.[1][2] She graduated in 1931.[3]

With Jessica Albery, Ledeboer spent six months on building sites in the City of London, learning in a hands on way from contact with foremen, clerks of works, and the wider building trades.[1]

Career

One of Ledeboer's early inspirations was the architect

Ministry of Health through World War II. She was the first female employee of the ministry to be responsible for housing,[4] and was secretary of the Dudley and Burt committees on public housing.[3]

In 1946, Ledeboer left the Ministry of Health and returned to practice with Booth. In 1956, John Pinckheard became a partner in the firm and it became Booth, Ledeboer, and Pinckheard.

Headington School, both in Oxford.[5]

Ledeboer designed several housing complexes in London for the Lewisham and Newham Borough Councils. The project for which she is best known is the elderly home on the Lansbury Estate in Poplar, London, which she designed for the Festival of Britain in 1951. She designed a neighbourhood unit in Hemel Hempstead in 1950–1955, comprising houses, flats, maisonettes and shops.[3]

Ledeboer left private practice in 1970 but remained an active member of the Royal Institute of British Architects and the Landscape Institute until the mid-1970s. She died in 1990 at her home in Hambledon, Surrey.[3]

Legacy

Ledeboer was described by Lynne Walker in the

Officer of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (OBE) in 1966.[3]

References

  1. ^
    ISBN 978-0-19-861412-8
    , retrieved 2 October 2021
  2. ISBN 978-0-19-861412-8
    , retrieved 2 October 2021
  3. ^
    doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/66415. Retrieved 24 October 2015. (Subscription or UK public library membership
    required.)
  4. ^ a b c d "Judith Ledeboer" (PDF). Women in Architecture. Retrieved 24 October 2015.[permanent dead link]
  5. ^
    ISBN 978-0-19-924866-7
    .
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