[3] She went on to develop a close relationship with the cartographer, Phyllis Pearsall, who had lived with Lavender's mother in Golders Green during the Blitz.
[6] While at Oxford University, Lavender began to date Chris Patten, a student at Balliol College.
[15] In 1988, after raising her daughters, she started practicing as a barrister, specializing in family law at 1 Garden Court Chambers, Temple.
Patten would hold “little-publicized parties” for children and elderly people at Government House[20] plus “at least 70 full-scale charity balls” throughout their tenure.
[21] Of her role as Governor's wife, Jonathan Dimbleby, a close friend,[3] wrote that her “public performance as the governor's wife earned her plaudits throughout Hong Kong and across the political spectrum.”[22] Patten redecorated Government House, bringing in Chinese furniture so that “for the first time in 140 years” the house was decorated in a Chinese style.
[3] Of her work, she said, “I found I could be quite helpful to the community groups by putting a word in the right ear.” She was instrumental in altering some traditionally held views, saying, “When we arrived, the authorities there did not have much sympathy for battered wives.” By the time she left, this had changed, and “the Government had taken the problem on board; the same with child abuse.”[24] She also spoke out over the treatment of people with intellectual disabilities, saying in 1993, “I am confident that sustained public education will bring a better understanding of disabled people.”[25] In January 1995, Patten met Mike Sinclair, a British dentist who was one of only two people in Hong Kong to have gone public with an AIDS diagnosis at the time.
[26] The photographs of the two of them together were “compared in the [local] press to the picture of Diana, Princess of Wales with Ivan Cohen, an AIDS patient, in April 1987.”[27] Sinclair died a month after their meeting.
[28] When the residents of a housing estate protested about the establishment of a home for people with Down's Syndrome locally, David Tang asked Patten to come to “demonstrate her support” which she did, even though there had been threats to “throw bags of excrement and urine in protest.”[3] Hong Kong charities and organizations of which she was patron included: After Chris's role in Hong Kong came to an end in July 1997, Patten was keen for him to leave his political career behind, saying “Quite frankly I fear for our family life if Chris pursues a political career.”[45] The Pattens bought a farmhouse in Tarn, southwest France, in which they lived for a year after leaving Hong Kong.