She is best known for her series of children's stories about the experiences of a small girl called Alie growing up in the fictional location Rivierplaas in rural Free State.
[2] Alba Bouwer was herself brought up on a farm in the Free State, and attended La Rochelle Girls' High School in Paarl, and Huguenot University College in Wellington.
Immediately after graduation Bouwer began work as a school teacher, but she left teaching to become editor of Huishouding, a newly established women's magazine.
From 1948 to 1950 she was a radio producer and presenter in the children's service of the South African Broadcasting Corporation, resigning in 1950 to take up an assistant editorship at the newly founded women's magazine Sarie, where she remained for thirteen years.
[5] Since 1989 the South African Academy of Science and Arts has presented a triennial Alba Bouwer Prize for children's literature, named in her honour.