60 Objects Como Collection
The Como collection contains a set of hand-made fans – made from either crepe paper and feathers or hand-painted, such as this example featuring a cockatoo.
Constance Fitzpatrick, nee Armytage, was an amateur painter who was taught by Arthur Merric Boyd. He and his son Penleigh were regular visitors to Como and documented the landscape surrounding the house in a series of watercolours.
Although little information has survived about the fan, it is interesting to consider that a pet cockatoo was kept by the Armytage sisters – Constance, Laura and Leila. A photograph survives of Gwen, the maid of all work, with the bird in the 1930s.
