Lady Jean Estelle Brodie-Hall (Verschuer) AM FAILA nee Slatyer
Jean was born Saturday, 15 August 1925 - Rockhampton, Queensland, the only daughter of Thomas Henry Slatyer and Jean Estelle MacKenzie, his wife. Jean’s father, Thomas Henry Slatyer, was a banker from a Queensland farming family. Jean is the middle child with two older brothers and two younger. Her eldest brother, Ken, studied dentistry, joined the air force during the war and was killed in action. Her next elder brother Bob studied engineering at UWA and joined the navy. Jean married married Ivan Barnes Verschuer in 1951 and remarried Laurence Brodie-Hall in 1980.

Her family moved to from Rockhampton, Queensland to Perth, Western Australia. Her parents built a house at 1 Hillway, Nedlands in inner suburb of Perth. Jean recalls spending time in the UWA grounds, which were largely bush. The memorial buildings were completed in 1932 and engineering was in the Shenton House building. Jean even then was interested in plants and disliked seeing people take away big bunches of leschenaultia from campus grounds. As a young child in Rockhampton, Jean remembers following the Kanaka gardener around. In the Nedlands home, Jean had her own garden plot.

Jean recalls going to a very good kindergarten, Miss McQuie’s kindergarten, Nedlands before going to PLC at age seven. In her last year of school, Jean as house captain for Stewart, won the prize for best school garden plot. Jean loved school but had no ambitions for post-school. At 18, she followed a friend into nursing at the Children’s Hospital [now Princess Margaret Hospital]. She loved nursing children and continued nursing in Melbourne before leaving for London in 1949 and work at Great Ormond Street Hospital, the main children’s hospital. She loved the experience but felt her parents needed her in Perth. She continued nursing at the Mount Hospital on her return and renewed a friendship with Barnes Verschuer. They married in 1951 and moved to Gooseberry Hill nearer Barnes&fsquo; dental practice in Guildford and Jean’s parents who had re-located to the hills. In Gooseberry Hill she pursued her interest in plants while her three children were young.

Jean was a founding member of the Australian Institute of Landscape Architects, serving on the Institute’s federal council for 10 years. She was also the Australian delegate to the International Federation of Landscape Architectsduring thst time, the last two years as president. She retired in 1981. She received a national award for landscape architecture in 1990 in recognition her leadership in Western Australian landscape architecture.

Jean worked with architecture firms Forbes & Fitzhardinge and Summerhayes & Associates in the 1960’s, and as consulting architect to large public companies, private firms, government agencies and local councils. Her projects included standard-gauge railway stations, the Salvation Army village in Hollywood, Western Australia, and the design of several mining towns and their surrounds.

She was admitted as a founding member upon the incorporation of the Australian Institute of Landscape Architects (AILA). Jean opened a private practice in Kalamunda, Western Australia where she worked extensively for the Western Mining Corporation on their Kambalda project, at the Kwinana Nickel Refinery, the Kalgoorlie Nickel Smelter and the Agricola College for the School of Mines.

Jean was engaged by the University of Western Australia (UWA) in 1970 to report on the changes to pedestrian and vehicle movement caused by the then recently completed underpass from the north of the campus, but continued to serve UWA, being appointed the inaugural University Landscape Architect upon the retirement of the curator in 1974. Her responsibilities included planning, design and maintenance of the campus and continued in that role until her retirement in 1981. Her projects included the improvement of Whitfeld Court, the Sunken Garden, Somerville Auditorium, the Great Court, the Tropical Grove, the Oak Lawn, Jackson Court, Prescott Court and Whelan Court.

Jean was entered as a Fellow of the AILWA in 1979, and was awarded the AILA Award in Landscape Architecture in 1990. She was made a Member of the Order of Australia (AM) for conservation and the environment in 2001 and received the Centenary Medal in the same year.

Jean Brodie-Hall has maintained strong connections with UWA, helping to establish the UWA Friends of the Grounds, becoming Patron of the UWA Centenary Trust for Women, The Kwongan Foundation for the conservation of Australia's biodiversity, as well as serving on numerous committees. A brief biography is listed in Wikipedia. A more extensive biography is at the University of Western Australia.