Diana Springall

Today in 2022, Springall largely works to commission. Her work has appeared numerous times in the Embroidery Magazine.

Springall’s major commissions include a panel for the London office of Mobil North Sea (1988), a carpet and panel for the entrance of Dai-Ichi Kangyo Bank, London (1989) and a memorial panel, Logica London, 1991.

In 1988, she was commissioned to create a seven-panel wall hanging for the University of Sheffield Library, by the Convocation of the University. In 2021, she was consulted about the conservation of this piece.

As well as continued work and curation of her collection, she is also an author and guest speaker and was involved in a BBC series on embroidery in 1980, as a consultant and part presenter. She mentors several emerging artists and was a mentor for the Hand and Lock Embroidery Award in 2021.

After completing her education, Springall started her artistic career creating work alongside being a full-time senior lecturer, a freelance tutor, and an external examiner. She published her first book, Canvas Embroidery, in 1969 and has published four further books since then.

Springall has two sons from her marriage; Richard Gordon Springall (born in 1965) and Lawrence Thomas Springall (born in 1969).

Springall started acquiring artworks for her collection in 1964 with a piece by Goldsmiths’ student Suzanne Armitt.

Springall received the Certificate of Embroidery by the City & Guilds of London Institute in 1963. She graduated in 1968 with a Diploma in History of Art and was awarded a personal accolade of Recognition status by the University of London.

Springall received her NDD in 1960 and remained at Goldsmiths for a further year to take an Art Teachers’ Certificate. This course required the practice of several crafts, including embroidery. Between 1954 and 1975, under the headship of Constance Howard, embroidery received equal qualification to painting, sculpture, and illustration at Goldsmiths College. It was a remarkable time for the art of embroidery, which saw the emergence of now well-known names: Anne Morrell, Audrey Walker, Christine Risley and Eirian Short.

In 1960, Springall married Ernest Thomas Springall. They divorced in 1977. David Daniel Auguste Piésold (1923–2008), a civil engineer, was her partner for 30 years.

Her collection includes textiles from the mid-1960s to the present and illustrates the breadth of the world of stitch.

Springall’s family left India for post-war Britain in 1947. Uncertain of further overseas postings, the siblings were sent to boarding school in Scotland. While there, they spent the school holidays in the embroidery-filled home of their great-aunt and grandfather. When, two years later, her parents settled in Kent, Springall attended the nearby Lillesden School in Hawkhurst where her art teacher, Nina Guppy, was inspirational in her choice of career.

Diana Alexander was born in Simla, India, on September 16, 1938, where her father, Gordon Alexander, was Under Secretary of State in the Indian Civil Service. Cared for by a governess and an ayah, Diana and her brother Brian had little opportunity to mix with other children. With family time reserved for Sundays, the pair became well practised at entertaining themselves. For Diana this included learning to paint and stitch. Because her mother, Stella Fuller, was a needlewoman, she was immersed in domestic embroidery. Her initial understanding of stitch in India shaped her character and her creativity.