Penlope Seidler reflects on architecture, travel and living with Harry

Penelope Seidler, architect, reflects on life OCTOBER 2008 ISSUE

As well as being an accountant and patron of the arts, the 69-year-old was married to renowned modernist architect Harry Seidler, who passed away in March 2006

My father, Clive Evatt, was a NSW government minister during World War II. He used to talk about the war all the time. His elder brother, Dr H. V. Evatt, was the foreign minister and he used to come and have dinner with us. I was about eight when the war ended and I thought there wouldn’t be any newspapers any more, that it was all over.

After the war there were all the complications with the communists and I’m sure
I was the only girl at Pymble Ladies College from a left-leaning family. It wasn’t a happy time.

My father desperately wanted me to do law like my elder sister, Elizabeth, but I didn’t want to because of all the studying. I enrolled in an arts degree and was in the revue with such people as Robert Hughes and Clive James. We had a wonderful time.

I met Harry in June 1957 at an architects’ party. It wasn’t love at first sight but when we went and had dinner he was so goal-orientated and interesting. My parents were appalled. Harry was too old (and had a) different background. That’s what I liked about him.

A fascinating world opened up after we married on my 20th birthday. Harry was 35. We honeymooned in Japan and China. Sadly, I’ve been cheated out of my 50th wedding anniversary.

I didn’t just want to be an architect’s wife, so I studied architecture to enter Harry’s world on an equal footing. Just after I finished I had my two children, Timothy and Polly, so the timing worked out well. Then we built the house in Killara, where I still am. It’s on the NSW Heritage Register and safe forever.

When the children went to school, I did an accounting/business degree because Harry didn’t give a damn about money. I enjoyed it but it was a lot of work. Harry would come home and find us all at the dining table working. It suited family life.

I was always an adventurous traveller. Harry took photographs of significant architecture in 40 countries for The Grand Tour (Taschen) and I usually went with him. We were really good at travel and didn’t care where we stayed.

When Harry got the Royal Institute of British Architects’ gold medal in 1996, we had a private audience with the Queen. She knew he had been interned and we touched on that. I got something out of it, too. We were absolutely equal.

One day in 1973 I got a letter asking me to go on the International Council of the Museum of Modern Art in New York. Harry was pleased because when he lived there he practically lived at MOMA. I’ve always been interested in the art world and increasingly so now that I’m alone.

The last 10 years that Harry was alive we hardly went out at all. We were at home one Sunday night and he started moaning and fell on the floor. He had a massive stroke and died 10 months later, just before his 83rd birthday. He was an amazing person and it was a good marriage. I miss him terribly but I keep very busy.