Artist Lottie Cole’s house is a contemporary blend of "ne art, antiques and mid- century design

Along with a love of !ne art and antiques, artist Lo"ie Cole has a keen eye for mid-century design

Known for her vibrant paintings of interiors ! lled with art and antiques, it is no surprise that Lo"ie Cole’s Sussex home re#ects this aesthetic. From the si"ing room, with its rich ochre walls and mix of striped and #oral so$ furnishings, to the guest bedrooms with their blockprinted wallpapers and charming quilts, every room is ! lled with decorative details that draw the eye.

The walls are hung with works by numerous artists from the 1950s to the 1990s, including Humphrey Spender, Peter Haigh, John Plumb and Adrian Berg, along with a changing selection of Lo"ie’s own paintings, many of which reference the works of midcentury British and continental artists.

Lo"ie and her husband Graham Haworth, who is an architect, bought the Edwardian farmhouse some !ve years ago. ‘ My mother lives nearby, in the village where I grew up, and when we began looking for a home in the country we concentrated our search on the surrounding area.’ The house, which dates from the turn of the last century, came with around 20 acres of grazing and some useful outbuildings. ‘Having acquired a second-hand tractor, my husband has adapted well to life in the country and now, courtesy of Zoom, he rarely needs to go to London,’ says Lo"ie, who, pandemic permi"ing, spends several days each week in London where she teaches drawing and painting at Minerva Workshop in Kentish Town.

She established Minerva two years ago and, apart from her classes, she also organizes cra $ workshops. Along with lampshade-making, there is block-printing with Louisa Loakes and Molly Mahon, wallpaper design

with Hugh Dunford Wood, specialist paint decoration with Alice Clark, paper- cu!ing and collage with Tracey English and natural dyeing with Zoë Burt. ‘ It’s been a lot of fun and I’ve learnt so much myself,’ says Lo!ie, showing o" a length of fabric she dyed and block-printed herself.

Whilst the house enjoys the most picturesque se!ing in the middle of Ashdown Forest, the interior, not having been touched for decades, needed a!ention. A newly built, barn-like structure designed by Lo!ie’s husband now provides a spacious kitchen, dining and living area, with sliding glass doors on both sides opening onto the garden.

‘One of the reasons for buying a home in the country was to have room for a studio, and the original kitchen is now where I paint,’ explains Lo!ie. ‘ There’s enough room for me to have several pieces on the go at once and there’s storage for canvases and materials in what was the adjacent scullery. I’ve always been fascinated by interiors,’ she continues. ‘ When my father was alive, he would enjoy buying something or other in one of the local antiques shops and surreptitiously installing it in the house, just to see how long it would take my mother to notice. She’s very observant so it didn’t take long! I can spend hours # icking through books and magazines, obsessing about

A newly built, barn-like structure, designed by Lo ie’s husband, now provides a spacious kitchen, dining and living area

wallpapers and fabrics and the art and objects on display in people’s homes. It’s harmless!’ she maintains. ‘ Whilst I occasionally venture outside to paint, most of my current work seems to be real rooms like those at Charleston, or those from my imagination such as a recent series inspired by works by well-known artists, which I’ve transposed into domestic se!ings.’

Portraits of chairs are another recurring theme. The se!ings and the styles vary but the focus is always the chair. ‘Antique chairs with their intricate details and signs of wear and tear are intriguing to paint,’ she explains. ‘ But next up is a commission featuring a Charles and Ray Eames design, so that will be rather di "erent.’

Furnishing and decorating the house will continue to be a work in progress Lo!ie says, but she is grateful for the ‘endless advice and help’ from interior designer and stylist Magda Devaris, who has since become a good friend. As the extension neared completion, Lo!ie took to eBay, auctions and antiques fairs. ‘As long as you don’t get carried away in a bidding war, auctions can be a cost- e"ective way to furnish a home,’ she says, showing o" one of her prize # nds:

a mid- century console in the hall that came from Lots Road Auctions.

Lo!ie’s taste is eclectic, she says, but the unifying factor is her preference for the individual, handcra "ed look. ‘ Making a home in a house built during the Arts & Cra "s era got me thinking about William Morris. I was struck by the continuing relevance of the principle that furnishing a home should entail choosing good design, using natural and sustainable materials.’ Standen, a local National Trust property built in the 1890s by Philip Webb, embodies this ideal, she says, and there are examples of Morris’s work in nearly every room. ‘ But rather than opt for designs that my great-grandparents might have chosen, I’ve opted for ones by my own generation that are more me,’ she laughs. Hence Molly Mahon’s delicate small-scale block-printed wallpaper was chosen for the guest bedrooms, while curtains in Mark Hearld’s Dove# ight provided the starting point for the varied shades of blue in the main bedroom and downstairs. Lindsay Alker’s Palmira design was chosen for the curtains in the si!ing room. ‘ Each design has a distinct character of its own, but what they share is that hand-printed quality that seems particularly appropriate here.’ An exhibition of Lo ie’s paintings will be held by Long & Ryle in 2022. longandryle.com

‘Rather than opt for designs that my great-grandparents might have chosen, I’ve opted for ones by my own generation’

ABOVE Artist Lottie Cole in her studio surrounded by recent works. FACING PAGE The ochre walls of the sitting room create a striking backdrop for the mid 20th-century paintings and contemporary ceramics by Joe Hoare. The large painting of a chair is by Lottie Cole.

RIGHT Lottie Cole’s painting of Arts & Crafts Emery Walker’s House in Hammersmith rests on a sideboard. Mid-century wicker chairs were found online from a dealer in Belgium.

ABOVE Old and new parts of the house form a harmonious whole. The extension was built using clay roof tiles and bricks in three different tones from Aldershaw Handmade Tiles of Sedlescombe. FACING PAGE A portrait of Lottie’s grandmother hangs at the foot of the stairs next to a portrait Lottie found at a local gallery; the sitting room walls are painted in Paint & Paper Library’s Muga, a rich ochre gold, which is the perfect foil for Lottie and Graham’s collection of modern British art. Although the room has a more traditional aesthetic than the open-plan living room, the mix of pattern and colour makes the space feel relaxed.

Against the neutral backdrop of the polished cement floor and walls painted in Farrow & Ball’s All White, accessories add pattern and colour to the angular midcentury sofa and armchair. The circular side tables by Tim Plunkett came from One The Square. The sliding glass doors are by Jansen. At the opposite end is the kitchen with a fitted pantry on one side and boot room and entrance lobby on the other. The vintage, glazed-front cupboard from Retrouvius is used for china and glass.

ABOVE The cupboards and fittings in the larder on the opposite side of the kitchen were made by Michael Simpson. Open shelves are home to vases and decanters. LEFT A large glazed cupboard is filled with a wonderful assortment of antique and contemporary glasses and ceramics.

ABOVE The sense of light and space in the main bedroom is maximized by the windowpane mirrors on either side of the bed. The lampshades are from Ashoka Designs. Bold patterns painted onto the bedside chests by Lottie add interest. The curtain fabric is Doveflight, a Mark Hearld screenprinted linen for St Jude’s, based on an original linocut. The landscape above the bed is by Adrian Berg of the gardens at Glyndebourne. RIGHT The throw is Bagru Dark Blue from Molly Mahon. The painting on the wall is by Humphrey Spender.

Buttoned headboards bordered with ornate giltwood made from a picture frame add to the decorative look of the guest bedroom. The walls are hung with paintings by Kathleen Mary Fryer, Charlotte Ardizzone and Carolyn Sergeant. The vintage Welsh quilts are from Antique Textiles Company in Hampstead.

ABOVE & RIGHT Hicksonian in Charcoal wallpaper, a David Hicks design from GP & J Baker, above simple panelling adds a chic 1960s flourish to the bathroom. This room was newly fitted with classic white sanitaryware and a mirrored metal cabinet above the basin.