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Dame Shirley Ida Conran (; 21 September 1932 – 9 May 2024) was an English author, designer, journalist, and social entrepreneur.
After Conran's marriage to Terence Conran, with whom she worked as a textile design and sales director at Conran Fabrics, she became women's editor of The Observer and the Daily Mail, launching its Femail section. After a serious illness left her with ME, making it difficult for her to work, she wrote best-selling books including the feminist self-help Superwoman (1975) and the bonkbuster Lace (1982).
In later life, Conran campaigned and founded charities to encourage maths education for women. For this, she was made a Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire and was invested in hospital a week before her death.
Following the breakdown of her marriage, Conran turned to writing in order to support her children. She wrote for the Daily Mail and in 1968 became women's editor and launched Femail, the newspaper's first dedicated women's section. Writing in the Mail in 2018, Conran reflected that this was the first time women in British journalism were being allowed free rein to write about what interests them, given "newspapers had only ever included a woman's section about knitting, dress patterns, recipes and the odd interview with worthy charity organisers." For its pioneering work, Conran believes the first edition of "Femail" magazine should be in the Feminist Archives.
Conran also became the women's editor for The Observer, and wrote columns for Vanity Fair. But her career as a full-time journalist was terminated at age 36 when she had a serious viral pneumonia. This left her with myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome – a debilitating condition which was not well understood and made it difficult for her to cope. She made notes to help her with the chores of housework and these were the basis for the book Superwoman, which her friend, Patrick Seale, pushed her into writing by obtaining an advance from a publisher. This was successful and coined the phrase that became a feminist slogan: "Life's too short to stuff a mushroom."
Her first novel, Lace, was published in 1982 by Simon & Schuster and was a huge bestseller, spending 13 weeks on the New York Times Best Seller list, reaching as high as No. 6. It became known as a 'bonkbuster' for its many explicit and often bizarre sex scenes. It was adapted into a 1980s US miniseries starring Phoebe Cates. It contains the infamous line: "Which one of you bitches is my mother?"
In 2009, she wrote that she suffered from ME.
Conran had homes in France and London, and lived in Monaco for several years.
She founded the educational non-profit Maths Action.
She died from pneumonia at a hospital in London on 9 May 2024, at the age of 91.
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