How Do You Present Women In Houses?

In preparation for starting my new job next week, I've been visiting a range of historic houses to see how they're marketed and also what's there.

We started out at Lyveden New Bield, a National Trust property in Northamptonshire. It was really interesting - I learnt a lot about the Catholic symbolism hidden in an unfinished Elizabethan house, and how it was never finished due to lack of finances and a son being implicated in the Gunpowder plot.The only bits about women that I remember are a) talking about the cooks in the kitchen, and b) talking about their large skirts brushing herbs on the paths making the gardens a sensory experience. I know that there's a lot more evidence relating to the men of the family in records and other sources, and that it was the male line that inherited in that day and age; however I do feel it is important that historic sites should at least mention the existence of women and why we can't say more about them.

Lyveden New Bield, Northamptonshire

I'm not saying every historic property needs to find an amazing women who escaped the expectations of her gender, I'm not saying that at all. But I think there is an important case for explaining the gender roles of women and girls in that era, rather than only making reference to the size of their skirts.

Next we visited another National Trust property, Canons Ashby, at the other end of Northamptonshire. The interpretation followed the family during the Victorian era this time, and a lot more information was given about the relationship between husband, wife and mother-in-law and subsequently father and daughter. We were also taken through the maids' quarters, so all in all a much fuller view of different women's lives during the time period. The maids' and daughter Alice's rooms are still in the process of being given interpretation - but what is currently there was enough to intrigue my partner who was with me to ask the steward in the final room (the Kitchen) 'and what about Alice?' as the current interpretation finishes with the father's death, or so we thought.

We were directed into a dimly lit basement where, if you strain your eyes against the lack of lighting, you can find out about the rest of Alice's life and the rest of the history of the house up to the present day. There's improvements to be made here, but they've at least started to shine a light on the many roles of women.

Lastly, yesterday, we went to Woburn Abbey. And I have to say that considering it is a Ducal family with the title and estates passing down the male line, the interpretation makes the women as memorable as the men. This site doesn't take the upstairs/downstairs approach, so you don't see the contrast in roles or lifestyles for people of the same gender in the same era so much. What you do see is the change over time. From the Duchess who invented afternoon tea, to the one who set up a military hospital and flew to India, to the current Duchess who you come to feel is spearheading the Garden renovation works - there are definitely strong female characters at this property. And they complement well with the stories of the male family members: the first Earl who was granted the former monastic property by Henry VIII, to the 6th Duke who renovated the gardens in the 18th Century with the landscape gardener Repton, to the 13th Duke who made the decision to open the property to the public.

My partner and I both came away from our day out yesterday, saying that it was the first property we had been at where we felt we didn't stick out like a sore thumb as a same sex couple. The diversity of the other visitors compared to those we'd encountered at National Trust properties was marked.

I can't exactly prove a direct correlation, but it is my personal hunch that presenting more diverse stories within a property will engage more diverse visitors. Step 1 is to talk about women as characters, not as skirts. Step 2 is to talk about other aspects of diversity in the interpretation.

Woburn already seems to be doing this. Now I'd like the National Trust to catch up.