Temporary workaround for traditional mpl figure behaviour with the ipympl widget backend

widget_figure_workaround.py

import matplotlib.pyplot as plt

def figure(figsize=None):
    'Temporary workaround for traditional figure behaviour with the ipympl widget backend'
    fig = plt.figure()
    if figsize:
        w, h =  figsize
    else:
        w, h = plt.rcParams['figure.figsize']
    fig.canvas.layout.height = str(h) + 'in'
    fig.canvas.layout.width = str(w) + 'in'
    return fig