In the year that we celebrate the 250th anniversary of the birth of Jane Austen, Beyond the Bonnets gives a voice to those who were overlooked by many but not neglected in Austen’s novels: working women. 

Jane herself was a working woman, and this unique exhibition, which has been specially created for her landmark anniversary year, explores the untold stories not only of working women in her novels, but those of real-life women from Regency Hampshire, whose lives mirrored her fictional characters. 

Through Austen’s works and her letters historic objects and an absorbing, immersive soundscape, encounter women in domestic service – so frequently footnotes in the narrative - or those who owned and ran their own business. Nursemaid to Jane’s brother Edward, Susannah Sackree (1761-1851) was such a faithful and beloved member of the Knight household, that unusually a portrait was commissioned of her. Basingstoke-born Mrs Mary Martin (1730 – 1823) ran an inn where she held public balls, familiar features in Austen’s works, and went on to run a draper’s shop with a lending library. Much of her story is known from public records following her bankruptcy. 

Compelling, heartwarming and emotive, Beyond the Bonnets reveals the unexpected and often precarious lives of working women at the time of Jane Austen.

  • jane austen beyon the bonnets

Dates and times

Please click or tap the calendar icon to select your date and press 'Go' to choose available visiting times.
  1. Sat 26 Jul 2025
    9:30am
  2. Sat 26 Jul 2025
    10:30am
  3. Sat 26 Jul 2025
    11:30am
  4. Sat 26 Jul 2025
    12:30pm
  5. Sat 26 Jul 2025
    1:30pm
  6. Sat 26 Jul 2025
    2:30pm
  7. Sat 26 Jul 2025
    3:30pm
  8. Sun 27 Jul 2025
    11:00am
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