A World of Unmentionable Suffering: Women's Public Conveniences in Victorian London

Abstract

This 9,500 word paper provides an in-depth analysis of a dispute that broke out in 1900 over a proposal to construct a women's public lavatory in Camden Town. Its aim is to provide a detailed account of how the decision to build an everyday object such as a lavatory for women was implicated in producing, maintaining and contesting the patriarchal power structure of late Victorian London.It seeks to build on the work of feminist cultural geographers like Doreen Massey and Gillian Rose and feminist architectural historians like Beatriz Colomina, who have argued that space does not merely reflect social identities, but is actively involved in producing them. Excerpts from this article have also been reprinted in Intimus: Interior Design Theory Reader, eds. Mark Taylor and Julieanna Preston, (Wiley-Academy, 2006). This research was also presented as a 30-minute documentary for BBC Radio 4, called “The Ladies' Room” which aired May 30, 1998. Reviewed by Lucinda Lambton, At whose convenience? New Statesman, (5 June 1998).