Dorothy Wills

Dorothy Mary Wills (27 March 1911 – 11 July 2007), also known as Dorothy Mary Coulthard, was a New Zealand architect, and the second woman to become a registered architect in New Zealand. the only child of George Herbert Alexander Wills and Mary Estelle Wills of Tauranga. Her father was actively involved in amateur theatre.

Wills was educated at Tauranga District High School, where she won a Junior National Scholarship in 1923. She went on to study for two years at Epsom Girls' Grammar School, and passed the matriculation examination in 1926. She also won a Senior National Scholarship.

Career Wills began her studies in architecture at the University of Auckland in 1929. By 1933 she had completed her examinations for Associate Membership of the New Zealand Institute of Architects. In 1934, she was the second woman in New Zealand to graduate with a B.Arch, and in 1936 she became the second woman in New Zealand to become a Registered Architect (after Lucy Greenish who was registered 20 years earlier in 1914).

Wills began her career as an architect in Tauranga, and was employed by architect H. L. D. West between 1933 and 1936. In 1935, Wills gave an address about architecture during an educational course for girls, run by the Women's Institute. After the war ended, she remained in Britain, working on housing projects. and also had an active social life.

In 1935, Wills was an office-holder in the Tauranga branch of the League of Nations Union.

Between 1933 and 1936, Wills was involved in the Tauranga Beautifying Society. In 1937, she was presented at Buckingham Palace along with several other New Zealand women.

In 1949, Wills returned to New Zealand to take care of her father, and settled in Wellington. The couple did not have any children. Her memorial is located at Ōmaka Cemetery, Blenheim, New Zealand. The Dorothy Coulthard Arts Trust made a grant for a kinetic wind sculpture by New Zealand sculptor Grant Williams that was installed outside the ASB Theatre in Blenheim in 2014.