Goldsmiths Textile Collection & Constance Howard Gallery

The Textile Study Collection at Goldsmiths was established by Audrey Walker in 1980 with a number of gifts and specially commissioned teaching samples. Since then, it has grown to include more than 4000 textile and print objects and archival materials, including a large part of Constance Howard's personal collection.

In 2003, with the support of a three-year Resource Enhancement Grant from the Arts and Humanities Research Board (now AHRC) and the leadership of Professor Janis Jefferies, the Constance Howard Resource and Research Centre for Textiles opened its doors for the first time in its new purpose-built archive and exhibition space in the historic Deptford Town Hall on New Cross Road under the stewardship of Curator Margaret Hall-Townley.

In the ensuing years, the centre has become a leading authority for the study of textiles, continuously engaged in the promotion and dissemination of our holdings now known as the Goldsmiths Textile Collection, since its formal adoption in 2010 into the college's family of Special Collections, managed by the Library.

For over a decade, the Constance Howard Gallery and Goldsmiths Textile Collection has supported the documentation of the pioneering history of textiles at Goldsmiths from the 1940s to the present and the development of British textile work throughout the 20th century.

Through our collaborations with alumni, contemporary practitioners, museologists, curators, writers, performers, oral historians, anthropologists and technologists, the Gallery actively promotes textiles as a primary source of cultural knowledge and heritage in the UK, and internationally. The Gallery cultivates the exploration of historical and contemporary textile practices throughout the globe, continuing our legacy of multi-faceted research from many different perspectives.

Links to Special Collections

Goldsmiths Special Collections and Archives

Special Collections Current Exhibitions