Sheila Waters

Sheila Waters (13 March 1929 – 18 March 2022 ) was a British calligrapher and teacher who spent the last half-century of her life in the United States.

Life Sheila Waters was born in Gravesend, England, on 13 March 1929. She graduated from the Medway College of Art, Kent, in 1948 with a Diploma of Design, and received an associate degree from the Royal College of Art in London in 1951.

At twenty-two, Waters was elected a fellow of the Society of Scribes and Illuminators. She inaugurated the program of calligraphy courses at the Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C., and later developed her own private classes and annual workshops. Waters was the first president and founding member of the Washington Calligraphers Guild.

Waters was married to bookbinder and conservator Peter Waters from 1953 until his death in 2003.

Books and artwork Between 1961 and 1978, Waters hand-lettered and illustrated an illuminated manuscript of Dylan Thomas' Under Milk Wood. The book was released in 1979.

Waters is the author of Foundations of Calligraphy, published in 2006. Her 2016 book Waters Rising: Letters from Florence documented her husband's efforts to save hundreds of thousands of books damaged in the 1966 Florence flood.

Time-Line Triptych is the name of an artwork from 1986 which consists of three works individually titled Ancient, Mediaeval and Modern in gouache and pastel.