Founder
Di Palin
Founder – Director · Principal Podiatrist · Podiatric lower limb biomechanist
A clinical mind. An entrepreneurial spirit. A lifelong curiosity about movement.
For Di, a foot has never been just a foot. It is a starting point for understanding how a person moves, lives and feels. That curiosity took her from Australia to Burlington, Vermont, for a graduate year working alongside Dr Michael Guerra DPM — an experience that helped shape the practice she would later build.
Her academic journey explored everyday clinical challenges and the complexity of human movement. The thread connecting them was a desire to question, investigate and bring deeper understanding back to patient care.
Business study at Harvard added another dimension: how to turn ideas into organisations that can make a difference. Di went on to grow Palin Podiatry and bring her vision to life at The Foot and Ankle Institute — a place where clinical care, research, innovation and education belong in the same conversation.
Today, that curiosity reaches from people to performance horses, from complex foot problems to the possibilities of bespoke footwear. At its centre is still the person: their story, their movement and what matters to them.
The next chapter? Another 20–40 years of asking better questions — and perfecting the art and science of happy feet.
Looking ahead: Global Masterclass 2027Di · Beyond the practice
A family legacy, a world of possibility.
Born in Geneva, Switzerland, Di has lived between Padua and Venice in Italy, in Sydney, Australia, and in Burlington, Vermont, in the United States. Her story crosses countries and generations, with family, craftsmanship and entrepreneurship at its heart.
For Di, the story of feet extends beyond the practice. Her Italian father, Caterino “Rino” Palin, took up shoemaking in retirement. Together, they brought his hands-on craftsmanship and her podiatry and biomechanics knowledge into a shared pursuit: footwear that truly serves the foot.
From Italian heritage to footwear entrepreneurship in Australia, that father–daughter collaboration helped shape Di's work with F8 Bespoke Football Boots. After Rino's death, Di announced the Palin Footwear Foundation to honour his legacy and support emerging footwear designers.
The family's gift is not a life without adversity, but the determination to create from it: turning challenges into possibility, and building something meaningful for this generation and those still to come.
That spirit lives at the heart of The Foot and Ankle Institute: stay curious, question what is possible and bring what we learn back to the people we care for.
From a family tradition of craftsmanship to an interdisciplinary approach to care, our purpose remains personal: helping people move forward, while creating possibilities for generations to come.
My philosophy · Our family motto
Stay curious.
Question what is possible, keep learning and bring that curiosity back to the people we care for.
“The foot is only as good as the environment it lives in.”
For me, that is where footwear begins: understanding the foot, then considering the shoe and orthoses as the environment it moves in.
Worked with
Arts
- The Australian Ballet
- WSDA Ballet
- Tanya Pearson Ballet
- The Australian Ballet
- WSDA Ballet
- Tanya Pearson Ballet
Sport
- Australian Rugby Union Juniors
- Australian Rugby Union Juniors
Medicine
- Dr Les Grujic · Foot & Ankle Surgery
- Dr Les Grujic · Foot & Ankle Surgery
Universities
Brands
Education
- Simon Bartold · Bartold Biomechanics
- Simon Bartold · Bartold Biomechanics