Thousands of women have turned cities in England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales into rivers of green, white and violet to mark 100 years since the first women won the right to vote in the UK.

Key points: Marchers celebrate enactment of Representation of the People Act

Marchers celebrate enactment of Representation of the People Act Event also intended to highlight work still to be done

Event also intended to highlight work still to be done Suffragettes led decades-long campaign to get women voting rights

Wearing scarves in the colours of the suffragette movement, women marched through London, Edinburgh, Cardiff and Belfast in events that were part artworks, part parades.

Their banners were inspired by the bold designs of the suffragettes, who led a decades-long campaign of protest and civil disobedience to get women voting rights.

The milestone they observed was the enactment of the Representation of the People Act, which in 1918 granted property-owning British women over age 30 the right to vote.

It would be another decade before women in the UK would have the same voting rights as men.

The London march flowed in bands of colour through the heart of the city, winding along Piccadilly and around Trafalgar Square before heading to Parliament, the seat of British political power.

Some participants dressed as Edwardian suffragettes or wore sashes in green, white or violet.

Women came from across England and even further afield to take part.

Banners were inspired by the bold designs of the suffragettes. ( AP: Frank Augstein )

Asma Shami from Lahore, Pakistan, said she rearranged her visit to Britain so she could attend the march and celebrate women's progress.

"It's so energising. We've come a long way, and we have a long way still to go," she said.

Helen Marriage, the director of Artichoke which organised Sunday's celebrations, said she was struck by the amount of enthusiasm for the project.

"A craft shop in London told us they'd run out of purple and green tassels, and they didn't know why," she said.

Mother and daughter Claire Gillett and Chloe Whittaker, from Great Saling in eastern England, wore green shawls and said they had recently discovered suffragettes among their ancestors.

Women came from across England and even further afield to take part in the London march. ( AP: Frank Augstein )

Ms Gillett said she was "super proud" of her foremothers, especially since she had always believed "women in our family aren't very outspoken or bold".

"It was quite empowering," she said.

The mood was celebratory, but Ms Marriage said the event also was meant to highlight the work still needed, from closing the gender pay gap to ending workplace sexual harassment.

It also hoped to erase any notion of the suffragettes as prim campaigners from a more polite age.

They defied the law, went on hunger strikes, broke windows and set off bombs in pursuit of their goal.

"They were really extraordinary people," Ms Marriage said.

"A thousand of them went to prison. They were force fed in prison. In today's terms, they would be described as terrorists."

AP