Mary Mitchell

Mary Frances Mitchell (21 August 1923 – 1988) was a British landscape architect.

Life Mitchell was born in Downton in Wiltshire, 1923. Her parents were Nancy (born Salter) and Albert Edwin Mitchell. Her father was a farmer, and she enjoyed being outdoors. She attended Clifton High School for Girls in Bristol.

She worked in South Africa after the war, and she returned to the UK in the 1950s, where she was employed by Birmingham's City Architect's office.

The Lee Bank area was designed in 1960 as a single unit by Birmingham's City Architect A.G. Sheppard Fidler. These consisted of 6-8 storey, brick built structures, however, when landscape architect Mitchell was appointed to help in the design, taller twenty storey tower blocks were introduced. The Lee Bank project was approved in stages between 1963 and 1967. It consisted of four 20 storey tower blocks, containing 464 flats, and one twelve storey tower block.

Mitchell became a fellow of the Institute of Landscape Architects in 1963. She established her own business and undertook work in the UK, Asia and the Middle East.

Mitchell was also a pioneering playground designer and was inspired by adventure playground advocate Marjory Allen.

Mitchell and Sylvia Crowe published in The Pattern of Landscape in 1988