Katherine Mansfield's Birthplace

Hello lovelies,

Recently I took a trip to Wellington and decided to visit the birthplace of Katherine Mansfield. She is a favourite writer of mine and I have taken a particular shining to her story The Garden Party as well as The Dolls House and Miss Brill which left me in tears.

Today I thought I would share with you some of the photos I took while I was touring the home and I highly recommend that if you are ever in Wellington, you must go and visit.

This here is the original manuscript for The Garden Party. Seeing this actually blew my mind. To be able to see her own handwriting, writing out the lines of one of my favourite short stories. I was so excited to be able to read the first line: "And after all, the weather was ideal."

 

 

And this photo is of the house that The Garden Party is based on. I had always had my own vision of what the house looked like and I was thrilled to see that my thoughts were actually very close to the real house.

 

Here is the lovely Katherine Mansfield, taken in 1916. The text below says "Would you not like to try all sorts of lives - one is so very small - but that is the satisfaction of writing - one can impersonate so many people."

They also had the original manuscript for The Dolls House too. There was another photo in the living room which was of Katherine's grandmother and in the background you can see the dolls house. It was amazing to know that the dolls house, and the little Kelvey girls really did exist.

A lovely photo of Katherine, John and Richard all together.

 

And finally, here is the house where Katherine Mansfield was born. It is a lovely home and I am so pleased that it has been looked after and that we are able to go and visit and look at all the photos and read the manuscripts and wander around a house that she has also been in. I did feel very lucky.

If you are a fan of Katherine Mansfield and you are in Wellington at some point, you must visit.

J.C Lemon xx