Philippa Stockley.

PHILIPPA STOCKLEY is a critically acclaimed, best-selling novelist; national-award-winning journalist; critic and reviewer, and professional painter. Her most recent solo exhibition Taking Stock was at the European Commission’s 12 Star Gallery. She holds MAs from Oxford University in English (Scholar), and art-historical clothing history from the Courtauld Institute of Art (Scholar), where she was a Royal Literary Fund Fellow for five years to 2019. She has written extensively on art and fashion for newspapers and magazines from The London Evening Standard to The Independent and Country Life; reviewed major exhibitions for The Evening Standard for more than a decade and reviewed books on all aspects of the arts for many nationals.

Her wide-ranging design career includes costume design; couture for private clients, and graphic design — from book jackets and illustration, for YALE UP among others, to shop-window painting (from Rococo to Tom Conran). She has painted murals and trompe-l’oeil widely in the UK and Europe.

Stockley has published three critically acclaimed novels and two non-fiction books: The Edge of Pleasure (a bestseller and WHSmith Book of the Week): Abacus 2002, Harcourt Brace 2002, A Factory of Cunning (a Washington Post Book of the Year and bestseller): LittleBrown 2005, Harcourt Brace 2005; Black Lily: Pimpernel Press 2018.

Her pungent evocation of history and setting has been widely praised. Her non-fiction book on restored old London houses (Restoration Stories: Pimpernel Press 2019) was an Amazon No 1 bestseller. Her latest book Paint & Make (Pimpernel Press, May 18 2023), was featured pre-pub in The Sunday Times. It shares decades of knowledge of painting, designing and making for the home, with a strong ethos of re-use and recycling, and 300+ photos and drawings by the author. The unique, beautiful and practical result is generous in tips and how-to.

Stockley has written fiction and painted since early childhood, sending her first story to Faber when she was seven.