Constance Howard

Constance Mildred Howard, later Constance Parker, (8 December 1910 – 2 July 2000) was an English textile artist and embroiderer who had a profound impact on the development and teaching of those subjects in Britain. The Constance Howard Gallery, part of Goldsmiths, University of London, is named in her honour.

Biography Howard was born in Abington in Northampton to Mildred Annie Abbott and Arthur Howard, a school teacher. In 1950, Howard designed a large textile hanging for the country pavilion of the Festival of Britain exhibition in London. The Country Wife was completed by Howard and her students, who included Mary Quant, and depicted the activities of the National Federation of Women's Institutes. In 1953, Goldsmith's established a separate department of embroidery and in 1958 Howard became its head of department. and in 1980, Goldsmiths opened the Constance Howard Gallery alongside a textile resource and research collection which contains Howard's own archive and lifetime collection of textiles. She designed ecclesiastical works for Lincoln Cathedral and Makerere University in Uganda and produced 200 kneelers for the College Chapel at Eton College.

Published works Design for Embroidery from Traditional English Sources, 1956 Inspiration for Embroidery, 1966 Embroidery and Colour, 1976 Textile Crafts, 1977 The Constance Howard Book of Stitches, 1979 Twentieth-Century Embroidery in Great Britain, 4 volumes, 1981-1986.