Frances Lincoln (also Frances Lincoln Publishers) was founded by Frances Lincoln (1945-2001). Educated at St George's School and Somerville College, Oxford, she first worked for Studios Vista, as assistant editor and ultimately managing director. From here, she moved to Marshall Cavendish, then to Weidenfeld and Nicolson, where she was given her own imprint. In 1977, she began working as an independent publisher, specialising in illustrated gardening books (from 1977) and illustrated children's books (from 1983).
Lincoln died aged 55 in 2001, and her husband, John Nicoll, ran the company until August 2011, when it was bought by Quarto Group.
In September 2018, Frances Lincoln, then an imprint of Quarto, was merged with imprints Aurum Press and Quintessence to form the single adult non-fiction imprint, White Lion Publishing, designed to specialise in categories such as travel, food and drink, wellness, and popular science.
