118 Gender and Space in Rural Britain, 1840–1920
Jekyll engaged with and redefi ned its boundaries. Jekyll’s success demonstrates
the existence of fl exible boundaries between the separate spheres, problematiz-
ing the accuracy of the previously perceived rigid Victorian gender ideolog y
whilst simultaneously acknowledging the existence of culturally appropriate
spaces for women (as well as men).^6
Th rough analysis of her articles, this chapter explores how Jekyll used her
garden designs and horticultural writing as a platform to disseminate her ideas,
express her own artistic intentions, successfully pursue a profession as a middle-
class woman within the masculine fi eld of garden design, and maintain an aesthetic
and personal connection with nature. It begins by explaining the theoretical and
gendered parameters of the fl ower garden. Examples from her writing are then
explored which demonstrate how she planned, networked and carefully presented
herself to her readers and male peers to achieve success, and, once established, how
she promoted her own knowledge, skills and opinions with bold assertion. Th e
fi nal section examines how she utilized the culturally acceptable feminine space of
the garden as a source of personal inspiration and refl ection that ultimately pro-
vided her with topics for her articles. Th us, Jekyll’s profession was based upon her
own enjoyment of this feminine space but, more signifi cantly, as this chapter con-
cludes, her inspired and tactical moulding of it allowed her to construct a career
that was simultaneously unprecedented and culturally acceptable.
Empowering the Garden
Th e Victorian English garden was strongly gendered. Just as the domestic envi-
ronment was the idealized and culturally accepted sphere for women, so too was
the domestic garden. Th ese notions were class specifi c, and Leonore Davidoff
and Catherine Hall argue that the domestic garden ‘provided strong visual con-
fi rmation of the middle-class ideal’.^7 Nothing could more succinctly defi ne the
garden as woman’s domain in Victorian ideolog y, both metaphorically and liter-
ally, than John Ruskin’s lecture on the roles, duties and parameters of women:
‘Of Queen’s Garden’s’ (1858–9).^8
Th is is wonderful – oh, wonderful! – to see her, with every innocent feeling fresh
within her, go out in the morning into her garden to play with the fringes of its
guarded fl owers, and lift their heads when they are drooping, with her happy smile
upon her face, and no cloud upon her brow, because there is a little wall around her
place of peace.^9Th is secluded fl oral sanctuary was seen as the most appropriate space for women
wherein their inherent nurturing and optimistic characteristics would thrive,
and their purity would remain unsoiled. Whether in the suburbs or the outskirts
of a small country village, because of their deliberate separation from the increas-
ing sprawl of urban spaces, domestic gardens were seen as pieces of untainted