An Architect's Dream
The Paul and Elizabeth Rivard’s home in Westwood Hills has a unique history that sets it apart in this community of well-designed, well-maintained Colonial and Tudor Revival homes in northeastern Johnson County. The original owner and architect of this handsome and unassuming brick colonial was Elizabeth Evans Rivard. Elizabeth was the first female graduate of the University of Kansas (KU) School of Architecture, and a pioneering woman architect in Kansas City during the 1920s.
Elizabeth was born Amanda Elizabeth Evans in Kansas City, Missouri, in 1899, although she was raised in Lawrence, Kansas. Her lifelong interest in architecture was rooted in her childhood. Designing homes was Elizabeth’s dream. During an interview she recalled, “I always enjoyed looking at house plans…. When my father said he was going to move into a new house, I could not bear to think that we would move into a house that was not designed correctly.”
Elizabeth Evans enrolled in KU in 1917 after working as a draftsman in Parsons, Kansas. Because of the shortage of men from World War I, she was given the rare opportunity to enter a field which previously had not welcomed women. After glowing reviews of her drafting abilities, a determined young Elizabeth was subsequently admitted into KU’s School of Architecture by Goldwin Goldsmith, head of the department. He, nonetheless, did not think that a female would make it through the program and he was overheard to say she would either “sink or swim.” Elizabeth, however, did swim, and quite well.
A noteworthy accomplishment of Elizabeth’s education was that her designs were entered into competitions under the genderless name “A.E. Evans.” Many of her professors believed that a woman would not receive any recognition or serious consideration as an architect. In 1921, as A.E. Evans, Elizabeth won the Beaux-Arts Institute of Design award for her entry design of a small chapel on a country estate. She was the second KU student and the first woman to receive such an acknowledgement. Elizabeth graduated from KU’s School of Architecture with honors in 1922.
She later moved to Kansas City, and after many employment rejections because of her gender, she began working for the Falkenburg Company as a staff architect. The Falkenburg brothers hired Elizabeth because they believed a woman architect could understand and relate to housewives’ needs in home design.
Elizabeth Evans Rivard practiced architecture for only about ten years, during which she produced several dozen commissions, all varying in size, style, and location. Her inventory of homes included various Tudor Revival, Mediterranean Revival, and Colonial Revival homes. Her favorite subject was the small, starter home for families of modest means. This home is the epitome of the style for which Elizabeth is associated: intelligently scaled, detailed, and integrated into its site. She lived here with her mother and sister until her marriage to Paul Rivard in 1927. Elizabeth gave up her practice in order to devote herself to her family. Paul and Elizabeth raised their family and lived in the home until 1986.
--ALBUM vol. 11, no. 3 (summer 1998)