The earliest item in her collection was a William-and-Mary house built in oak in about 1690 in the shape of a cabinet, suitable to be displayed in a drawing room. Dolls' houses were initially created as a status symbol, built as a replica of the owner's home or as an ornament on a staircase landing. Only after the 1840s were they intended for children. After her children left home, Greene began a personal mission to view, draw and catalogue any historic dolls' houses she could discover before they, and the great English country houses in which they were found, disappeared in the postwar world. As many as possible she restored to their original grandeur, paying great attention to historical authenticity. Greene's first book English Dolls' Houses of the 18th and 19th Centuries (1955) is credited with convincing dealers and museum curators that doll's houses were a serious field of study and required conservation. Her notes record 1,500 dolls' houses that she examined in North America, Europe and South Africa. In 1962 she even made the journey through Checkpoint Charlie to Communist East Germany to research the original plans of 19th century makers of miniature furniture based at , near Waltershausen, Thuringia. In 1962 she built the Rotunda as a doll's house museum in the grounds of her home near Oxford, incorporating the spiral staircase from the St James's Theatre. The museum was partially funded by Graham Greene and opened by Sir Albert Richardson, who later donated a dolls' house. By the mid-1990s, the Rotunda contained over 50 miniature castles, cottages and manors, all furnished down to the last tiny piece of porcelain, dating from c. 1700 to 1886. The focus was specifically on the craftsmanship, and only children over sixteen years were allowed to visit on the monthly opening to the public. Her collection was auctioned off in London in 1998. A cat lover, she was a supporter of the Protection of Tigers League. Death Vivien Dayrell-Browning Greene died on 19 August 2003 in Oxfordshire, at the age of 99. Publications The Little Wings: Poems and Essays (1921) (as Vivienne Dayrell) English Dolls' Houses of the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries (1955) Family Dolls' Houses (1973) The Vivien Greene Dolls' House Collection (1995) (with Margaret Towner) Laurel for Libby: A Story with Cuts (2006) See also Graham Greene References 1904 births 2003 deaths British child writers Converts to Roman Catholicism English