Background
She was born near London,, in a family famous for several members being engaged in publishing and printing, founding three different firms, most notably Allen & Unwin. Nora grew up with a passion for art
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Nora Spicer Unwin
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Her parents allowed her to convert the upstairs nursery of their Surrey home into her first art studio. She enrolled in Leon Underwood’s prestigious London art school, then continued her training at the Kingston School of Art and the Royal College of Art where she received a diploma in design in 1932. During these eight years of specialized training, she explored several mediums including: book illustration, pottery, wood carving, embroidery, bookbinding, mural decoration, engraving, etching, and architecture.
She is best known for her work in book illustration and wood carving.
Her first commission for an illustration came at the age of eighteen. While at the Royal Academy two of her wood engravings were selected for display at the British Museum.
She credits a wartime job working with children and living in a rural setting as influential in her book illustrations. The natural world had provided inspiration for many of her illustrations and woodcuts and the New flora and fauna provided many new sources for her.
She subsequently moved to Wellesley, Massachusetts near Boston, where she both illustrated books at taught art, and then back to the country at Peterborough, New Hampshire.
In 1955, Unwin traveled and studied in Mexico to be closer to Boston’s cosmopolitan lifestyle. She continued to illustrate children's books and she also began teaching art again. Soon tiring of the pace of city life, she moved back to the New Hampshire countryside in 1962.
In Peterborough, she continued teaching and working closely with Yates.
She remained in New Hampshire teaching, exhibiting her art, and illustrating many books until her death in 1982. She contributed illustrations to more than 100 books by other authors, and wrote and illustrated twelve books of her own, and is also importance in the twentieth-century revival of wood engraving.
The Sharon Arts Center in Peterborough, New Hampshire is the keeper of the Nora South. Unwin Collection. The Unwin family still lives in Surrey, a few in United States of America and Cyprus as well.
