Yes, you can have your dream studio! At the tail end of 2024, a long time ambition started to come to fruition...

I have worked in a large variety of places during my 30 year career as an artist from the pleasingly spacious unused outbuildings of a further education college as artist in residence and less glamorously a garden shed!

When we moved to the West Midlands in 2008 I fulfilled my dream of opening my own gallery, which was a good choice and I was very happy and successful in Bridgnorth for eight years. Unfortunately I could not stay there longterm as the building was built in 1665, which gave it character, but also meant that the sandstone walls were mouldy and crumbling and it was rather dark and cramped, not to mention its tiny staircase was ruining my knees!

I kept the name of my gallery alive following my subsequent move to a more healthy, purpose built studio at the Red House Glass Cone in Stourbridge Glass Quarter. Sadly, the local Council, who owned the site attempted to raise the rent by an unholy amount at the same time as Covid came along, and so after a bit of a kerfuffle, I chose to abandon ship to work from home and absconding our double garage at home as a temporary workspace. Unfortunately, the garage was also rather damp and dark - the need for affordable space, which is often absent in the U.K. means artist often find themselves working in less than ideal conditions - and so I began to plan improvements! You can see what the garage space looked like, which was a little rustic but quite serviceable, before its transformation in the video below...

What follows are some before and after pictures of the build in progress. Doing this was an interesting experience and quite fun…once…but I don’t think I would like to repeat the process because of the ensuing chaos it brings - there are still bits and bobs to clean up almost a year later! Here’s hoping that this is my forever studio and that it will serve my needs for the indefinite future! For now, it gives me a welcoming space in which visitors can browse artwork privately or enjoy participating in a workshop with a group of friends. To visit, please get in touch or you can book into a workshop here.