Sylvia Holland (1900-1974)

Sylvia Holland was the first registered female architect in British Columbia. After her husband died, she took her two children and moved to Los Angeles where she worked for Universal Studios and later MGM as a background artist. Walt Disney hired her as one of his first women animators.

See the full story in Sensational Victoria: Bright lights, red lights, murders, ghosts and gardens

I had a really interesting chat with Theo Halladay recently. Theo is 83 and living in the house her mother designed in the San Fernando Valley near Los Angeles. Theo was born in Victoria, and I’m quite fascinated with her mother Sylvia Moberly Holland, the first registered woman architect in British Columbia.

The London years:

Sylvia met Frank Holland at the Architectural Association School in London. Soon after graduation, they married and moved to Frank’s home town in Victoria. They designed an arts and crafts house at 1170 Tattersall Drive in Saanich.

In 1928, two years after moving into their house, Frank died leaving Sylvia, 28, to raise Theo, not yet two, and her brother Boris, born a month after his father’s death.

B.C.’s First female architect:

Being taken seriously as a female architect would be challenging at any time, but with two young children to support and on the eve of the Great Depression, it was devastating.

Theo says her mother rented out the Saanich house to William Weir McGill, a pharmacist and his wife Gertrude. They opened a preschool , and the Hollands moved to Rocky Point, Metchosin in 1932 where Frank’s parents had a farm. Sylvia worked on two architectural commissions. The Collinson residence at 640 St. Patrick Street in Oak Bay in 1935 and the Tysoe residence on Arbutus Road in Saanich the following year. Mostly though, she farmed.

The final blow came when Boris was diagnosed with the same mastoid infection that killed his young father.

Move to California:

“The doctor told her that Boris would not survive in the damp climate of Victoria and she would have to take him to a desert climate,” says Theo. “So in 1938 we all climbed aboard the train to LA and my mother picked up a car that she had ordered and headed for the desert.”

Sylvia put the two children into a boarding school and started to look for work to support them.

She never sought work as an architect, but fell back on her art training and was hired first by Universal Studios and then by MGM as a background artist. After gaining a solid reputation Walt Disney hired her as one of his first women animators. She worked on productions such as Fantasia and Bambi. Sylvia worked for Disney for several years, had a stint as a Christmas card designer, then bought an acre of land in the San Fernando Valley. She designed a large two-storey house and bred Balinese cats.

She never remarried. “All the single guys at Disney were courting her, but she chose to retain her independence,” says Theo. “She said ‘if I had a man what would I do with him’?”

Sylvia died in 1974.

Sign in the basement of 1170 Tattersall Drive

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