Beatrix Potter1866–1943A view over hills and valleys
Can I see it?
Not on view at present
Where is “A view over hills and valleys” now? Collection: Victoria and Albert Museum, London. Not on view at present. Checked September 25, 2026.
London, United Kingdom
It belongs to the collection, but is not on display at present.
- Checked
- In this state since
- Source
- The museum
About the work
Beatrix Potter is one of the world's best-loved children's authors and illustrators. She wrote the majority of the twenty-three Original Peter Rabbit Books between 1901 and 1913. The Tale of Peter Rabbit (Frederick Warne, 1902) is her most famous and best-loved tale.
Read on
This undated landscape sketch utilises an autumn palette of reds and greenish-browns. The subject has not been identified but the Potter scholar Leslie Linder considered the Newlands Valley in the Lake District a possibility. The presence of what looks to be a lake in the centre right of the composition and the rolling hills might also point towards the area around Esthwaite Water, where Hill Top was situated. Beatrix Potter first visited the Lake District aged sixteen when the family stayed at Wray Castle and over the next twenty years they spent many of their summers in the area. Following Beatrix Potter’s purchase of Hill Top in Near Sawrey in 1905 she made studies of Near Sawrey in all seasons.
Victoria and Albert Museum
Details
- Accession number
- BP.1077
What it shows
In the catalog
Sources
- Victoria and Albert Museum
- Image: Victoria and Albert Museum — © Victoria and Albert Museum, London
In the life of Beatrix Potter
The whole life1903
A patented Peter Rabbit toy: the birth of character merchandising
In 1903 Beatrix made and patented a Peter Rabbit doll — he became the first fictional character made into a patented soft toy, and so the oldest licensed character. Painting books, board games, wallpaper, figurines, baby blankets and china tea-sets followed under licence from her publisher Warne, earning her an independent income, and Harrods catalogues list Peter merchandise from at least 1910.
1905
Engagement to Norman Warne, and his death
In 1905 Beatrix and her publisher Norman Warne became unofficially engaged; her parents objected because Warne was “in trade” and so socially unsuitable. The engagement lasted only a month: Warne died of a blood disease at the age of 37.
1905
Buys Hill Top Farm in Near Sawrey
In 1905, with the proceeds of her books and a small legacy from an aunt, Beatrix bought Hill Top Farm in Near Sawrey in the Lake District, six miles west of Lake Windermere. She and Warne may have hoped it would be their holiday home, but after his death she went ahead with the purchase, as she had always wanted to own that farm and live in “that charming village”.
1905–1913 · Education
governance
15 October 1913
Marriage to William Heelis and the move to Near Sawrey
On 15 October 1913, at St Mary Abbots in Kensington, the 47-year-old Beatrix married William Heelis and moved with him straight to Near Sawrey, to Castle Cottage, the renovated farmhouse on Castle Farm. Hill Top remained a working farm but was remodelled to house the tenant family and her private studio and workshop.
c. 15.10.1913
Married: William Heelis
