Monika: It sounds like you turned your passion into real, tangible change. Was that the moment when you decided to take a more academic path?
Susanna: Ultimately, I felt I needed to become more than just an enthusiastic amateur historian – I decided to pursue an academic path as a garden and architectural historian. In 2004, I completed a Master's Degree in Garden and Landscape History at Birkbeck, University of London.
After that, I was commissioned as an independent researcher by the government agency English Heritage (now Historic England) to study a particular aristocratic estate in Dorset that was then on the ‘Heritage at Risk Register’. It was a huge study that took me two years to complete but the result was a groundbreaking 600-page report (plus appendices) arranged over three volumes. My English Heritage report went on to substantially inform (and underpin) the subsequent conservation plan of this park and garden, which, by the way, contains a beautiful 18th-century grotto and numerous other historic buildings, plantings, and features.
The subsequent project was taken on with gusto by the current generation of this old English aristocratic family. They won many awards for the restoration of the park. They have often referred to my English Heritage study as a key starting point for everything that followed.
Monika: You must have felt proud seeing your research come to life like that. However, as rewarding as it is, it isn’t always easy financially.
Susanna: I should say that as much as I love working with historic places, and I am truly passionate about the subject, on the whole, I found that garden history does not yield a very good living. On top of that, it is solitary, laborious, and time-consuming. And there are many very dedicated amateur historians around to fill the gap.
Alongside my freelance work as a professional Garden Historian (some paid, mostly not), I took the trouble to learn how to do professional picture framing – and since 2007, picture framing and mirror-making is what I principally do to make a living. This is something that I have become quite good at. I have wonderful clients, and I relish every day of the work. No two pieces of work and no two clients are alike. I imagine in the long run that when I am eventually forced to retire as a picture framer, I will focus more on garden history in order to keep my brain active.
Monika: Which of your creations or restorations do you feel carries the most of your essence — the projects where you can truly see yourself in the work?
Susanna: Well, there are two, really – at least as far as my work with the historic building preservation trust.
Monika: I can already tell there’s a story behind each one! What’s the first?
Susanna: The first is Garrick’s Temple to Shakespeare and Temple Lawn in Hampton – a project the Trust took on in 1998. This building was originally built in 1756 as the focal point in the riverside garden of the great Shakespearean actor David Garrick. With this project, I learned so much about developing an important historic conservation project, getting the project fully funded, and most crucially – galvanising public support. I had excellent help through an actor who lives locally. He was able to get a whole list of support from other British actors, including Dame Judi Dench, Sir John Gielgud, Peter O’Toole, Hayley Mills, and others. The ‘names’ (as we called them) really helped us when our fundraising document went out to the grant-making trusts.
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| Susanna receives the 2007 Georgian Group Architectural Award from Lord Heseltine for the Cilwendeg Shell House project. |
Monika: That’s quite a star-studded list of supporters!
Susanna: During the project, I also learned quite a lot about picture framing and exhibition design, which I have since used in developing my later career. The centrepiece of the permanent exhibition in the Shakespeare Temple titled The Life of Garrick is a full-sized resin cast of the original Statue of Shakespeare that Garrick had originally commissioned for the building from the sculptor L. F. Roubiliac in 1757. Acquiring the exquisite copy for display in the Temple interior required that I use my negotiating skills with the staff and administration of The British Museum.
Ultimately, the statue and other artifacts were gifted or loaned to the project. The great thing is that after all these years (since its initial inspiration in the 1990s) Garrick’s Temple to Shakespeare is still open to the public and still much loved and appreciated as a cultural asset.
Monika: How wonderful that your work there continues to live on and inspire visitors! And what about the second project you mentioned?
Susanna: The second project that I feel quite personally invested in is a rustic shell house grotto in Pembrokeshire in Wales, originally built within a charming woodland walk in 1826. It is called The Cilwendeg Shell House Hermitage. When we first discovered it in 2001, it was very derelict/ruinous, but despite that we were able to get the project funded and the resulting restoration project has been a conservation triumph. This project went on to win the coveted Georgian Group Architectural Award in 2007 and a Civic Trust for Wales Award in 2006. Many magazines have featured it, including World of Interiors and Country Life.
Monika: What is it like for you to visit such a magical place now, after having helped bring it back to life?
Susanna: The best part is that each year, many hundreds of visitors pay homage to this extraordinary site and it is becoming wonderfully self-sustaining now with a dedicated website that allows visitors to book access in advance. I so enjoy going there a few times a year to do voluntary work in the woodland garden, and I adore meeting visitors while I am there. I relish telling them the story of the place and the more personal story concerning my involvement and the restoration.
By the way, during the restoration of the Shell House Hermitage, I worked with the internationally acclaimed shell-work artist Blott Kerr-Wilson who taught me so much about the art of shell-work. I have since developed my own practice creating shellwork mirrors for clients as an enjoyable extension of my framing business.
Monika: Oh, that’s lovely — it’s like the project sparked a whole new creative path for you. And you mentioned there’s one last restoration that’s especially close to your heart?
Susanna: There is actually one last restoration project I am proud to have embarked on – a personal endeavour (not owned or directed by the preservation trust). This one is an old historic 18th-century French townhouse that my husband and I bought in 2019. With this project, I am fulfilling a dream I have held onto since childhood – to own and restore a house in France. This will undoubtedly be my last project – and certainly my most personal one.
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| Photo circa early 1970s of Susanna's parents. |
Susanna: My mother was truly remarkable and, yes, as an adult, I fully recognised her strength, determination, and her compassion for people – especially people who didn’t quite fit into society. She quietly sided with the underdog and was drawn to the delightful stories of eccentrics and other misfits. I have always admired her intelligence, too.
She read everything because she was interested in the world and cultures, and the accomplishments of extraordinary people against all odds. She was a speed reader – she could finish a whole book in an hour or less and still retain in her mind the essence of each page. If you asked her afterwards about the contents of a particular page or chapter, she could immediately give you an accurate summary as well as some key word-for-word quotes.
As far as my looks, I never looked much like my mother – she was very short, petite, and had both Anglo-American colonial ancestry going back as far as the late 17th century in Pennsylvania and also Native American ancestry – the Native American part came through strongly with her physically – this was also the case with my older sister. I suppose I was a bit more like my Dad, who was a tall Scotsman – sandy-haired and thoroughly irreverent. I inherited my Dad’s rather Viking-like height and (privately) his bawdy sense of humour that he had picked up from his own parents.
Monika: She was the kind of woman who could have run her own library! Did she pass that love of reading on to you?
Susanna: Today we have the internet and AI but back then we had Mom! I was never able to acquire the skill of speed reading myself, but I read lots, always – sometimes very specific subjects – sometimes just anything to pass the time and learn. Like my mother, I learned a lot in books and periodicals about the world and history, and art, before I ever left home. My mother was very interested in cooking and travel – she had hundreds of cookbooks from around the world.
She also loved historic American architecture and traditional crafts. She adored Colonial Williamsburg and collected early American artefacts, particularly quilts and other textiles. She became an expert quilter herself, laboriously copying historic designs and creating her own ‘patchwork’ designs too (many of which I inherited after she passed). I suppose, ultimately, her interests and pastimes did have a big influence on me.
Monika: Your mother had a wonderfully creative spirit. I can see where you get yours from. Was she supportive of your artistic pursuits as well?
Susanna: She had always wanted to work as a nurse. After she had finished high school in the mid-1930s, she started nursing college but only finished her first year. Back then, the female nursing students were not allowed to get married during their training, and if they did marry, they had to quit the college. For a while she apparently kept the fact of her marriage to my Dad secret but eventually she was found out.
When I was young, she went back to nursing college as a mature student (age 48) and graduated top of her class. We were so proud of her pursuing that dream. Then when I was 49 years old, I likewise completed my Garden History M.A. with distinction, and I remember thinking that I had somewhat followed the example of my Mom.
Monika: What a beautiful parallel, almost like your mother’s determination lived on through your own achievements. Did that realization change the way you thought about her?
Susanna: I suppose it did, yes, and since then I appreciate my mother even more as I enter my final chapter in life - and I especially like to look back and reflect on her astonishing strength and intelligence. I am truly grateful to her for everything she did for me and the unconditional love she gave me - and my lonely friends too! I am mightily proud to be her daughter.
Monika: So you got your mother’s intellect and heart, and your father’s height and sense of humor, quite the combination!
Susanna: Since my earliest memories, my mother had grey hair, and my Dad was bald. I was born when my parents were in their late 30s, and I remember that kids at school thought they were my grandparents and would taunt me about it.
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| Susanna at age 16 when she first arrived in San Francisco. |
Susanna: I suppose it could be argued that I actually started my transition once I began reading about Christine Jorgensen in some newspapers in the early 1960s (when I was maybe six or seven years old, I think it was), and then later on in the 1960s I saw her on US television. Seeing her on some talk shows, I thought Miss Jorgensen was so beautiful, poised, and articulate – of course, being very open about her transitional journey had a tremendous effect on me. I wanted to find a way to articulate this for myself but I didn’t have the words. I needed that precedent – and here was Christine.
Monika: It was such a powerful moment for a young girl to witness — to finally see someone who mirrored how you felt inside. Did it make things clearer for you from that point on?
Susanna: I always felt as though I was a girl myself, and I simply could not bring myself to accept that I was obliged to pretend that I liked being a boy. Never saw myself that way – never. The idea of growing up and having to be a man (or pretend to be) positively terrified me.
I remember sitting there in our living room with my mother, and I told her I wanted to be like Christine Jorgensen. My mom immediately changed the subject and the channel! I kept wondering – did she even hear what I said? I thought she must surely know this is how I feel – how I’ve always felt.
Monika: Did you bring it up again later, or did it stay unspoken for a while?
Susanna: In 1967, when I was 12, I read an article in a national magazine about ‘transsexuals’ and the establishment of the first Gender Identity Clinic (Moore Clinic) at Johns Hopkins University. The article referenced the publication titled The Transsexual Phenomenon by Dr. Harry Benjamin (a book first published in 1966, which ultimately came to be dubbed ‘The Transsexual’s Bible’). I knew I had to somehow access this book, which was really a medical text addressed exclusively to practitioners, rather than for transsexuals themselves.
And there was Christine Jorgensen’s autobiography that appeared around the same time. I asked discreetly at our local library but they stocked neither book. I visited a local bookshop that boasted they could order any publication worldwide. So they ordered both for me, I gave them a small deposit, and I started immediately mowing lawns and trimming gardens in our neighborhood in order to earn the money to pay for these.
Monika: You were so determined, that’s amazing for a 12-year-old! Did your mother know at that point what you were doing?
Susanna: When the books finally arrived, the store manager told me I would need a parent with me to collect them. So that is how I came to tell my mother. What she said immediately is that she had always been afraid I was going to say this. She knew I was different and she was afraid for me and apprehensive about how my Dad might react.
In fact, for so long other kids had been saying they thought I looked and behaved too much like a girl. I was teased relentlessly. I was humiliated by older kids and even teachers! My Dad used to take me to the barber shop and would make me get a crew cut because when my hair grew to a certain length, it made me look like a girl – or so he thought.
Monika: Having to face that kind of pressure from both peers and adults, how did your mother handle it once you told her openly?
Susanna: My mom said she had already read the article about the Johns Hopkins Clinic and had hoped I didn’t. She confirmed that she had heard me when I said I wanted to be like Christine Jorgensen. She recalled she started crying and said, “You know, of course, people will laugh at you and you won’t like it. They giggle when Christine Jorgensen comes on TV. They treat her like a joke. Is this what you want for yourself?”.
Despite her fears for me, she agreed to come with me to collect the books. I asked her to read them first and then tell me what she thought. And I would read them myself afterwards and tell her why I believed I fitted into this ‘transsexual phenomenon’. So, it started there when I was 12, almost 13. Just me and my Mom on the scary journey.
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| Susanna in New York at age 17 shortly after meeting Salvador Dali. |
Susanna: Well, first of all, there was then no guidance for any such transition at my very young age of 13. Having read both books, my mother agreed to write to Dr. Harry Benjamin to enquire if individuals my age had ever been referred to him for an appraisal – and if so, how did it work and how much would it cost just to have an initial consultation with him.
He had offices in New York and, apparently, a summer clinic in San Francisco at that time. She also asked him if perhaps there was anyone who had completed treatment and fully transitioned that we could communicate with, so we might better understand the process and personal outcomes of transitioning.
Monika: She really must have loved you deeply to even try reaching out like that.
Susanna: Dr. Benjamin’s secretary, “Virginia,” responded to my mother in due course, explaining that he was away from New York and would return after the summer when he could respond more directly. She was able to oblige the request of referring us to a support organisation that could put us in touch with people who had successfully transitioned.
We were provided with the address of the Erickson Educational Foundation, which had been established by the wealthy philanthropist Reed Erickson, a female-to-male transsexual. Later, Dr. Benjamin wrote to us and explained that I would likely be too young to receive hormone treatment, but suggested that a first step may be to consult a locally based child psychiatrist.
Monika: That must have been both exciting and frustrating, to finally have a doctor respond, but to still hear that you were “too young.”
Susanna: Dr. Benjamin had noticed a description in my mother’s letter regarding how I started to have some minor breast development (gynecomastia) fairly recently as my puberty started, and my hips seemed a little wide for a boy even before that. My gym teacher at school had apparently noticed this physical trait and also my shyness in the locker room and reluctance to go to the showers. He called in my parents to discuss it (something I wasn’t aware of at the time). Dr. Benjamin suggested in his letter that we should consult an endocrinologist, since this sort of physical development at puberty could possibly be indicative of one of several genetic variations, including Klinefelter’s Syndrome and Morris Syndrome (now known as AIS or Androgen Insensitivity Syndrome).
Monika: Your body was already quietly showing you who you were, even before doctors could explain it. How did your parents react to all that information?
Susanna: My mother acknowledged to me that this could be significant from a medical standpoint but she became concerned that the costs would be far beyond what she and my father could ever afford. And then there was my father – what would he say about all this? Would he understand it, accept it?
The answer, when it first came, was a resounding no! He was not going to accept that his youngest son would become a girl. He would not believe that there could be anything wrong with me that he, as my father, couldn’t help me to put right. So that was the big challenge, and it rapidly became a huge problem between my parents, which I didn’t want.
END OF PART 3
All photos: courtesy of Susanna.
© 2025 - Monika Kowalska
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