Celebrating 10 years

Owls of The British Isles wallpaper

My first design Owls of the British Isles launched 10 years a go.

I initially started designing wallpaper for fun, there was no business plan and no expectations. I was working full time as an interiors stylist for magazines and commercial clients but I had carried on drawing after leaving art school whenever I had any spare time. Whilst drawing one day, it occurred to me that one of the little illustrations of an owl that I was working on would work better on a wall than in a sketchbook, so I decided to create a wallpaper.

I had no experience with pattern design so I just drew owls over and over again for months and months at the kitchen table in the tiny flat that I was living in at the time. Until one day I thought they looked right and the pattern repeats joined up. These turned in to my first two wallpaper designs: Owls of the British Isles and Briar Owl.

I was very lucky that people liked these first designs enough to buy them, so I designed more, and more and then just carried on designing until it became my main business and passion.

Thanks so much for your support over the last 10 years, especially over the last year, which has been especially difficult for all small businesses.

Briar Owl in Gold wallpaper

Briar Owl in Silver wallpaper

Photographs by Alun Callender