A magical Dorset cottage brought to life by botanical artist and set designer Tattie Isles
‘With everything I do, I strongly believe it’s about creating a feeling, rather than just a look,’ says botanical artist and set designer Tattie Isles, standing in the garden that surrounds the 18th-century house in west Dorset that she shares with her husband Fred and their four young children. Since she launched her studio in 2010, Tattie has become known for her extraordinary, otherworldly installations – from weddings that go far beyond flowers and are rich with atmosphere, to her wild and wonderful take on the Bull Ring gate at Chelsea Flower Show this year, created in collaboration with Atlantic Salmon Trust, where she has deployed honeysuckle, river plants and stripped willow to conjure up the feeling of an untamed riverbank and highlight the plight of a now endangered species. ‘I find that if you start with the aim of creating a feeling, you will end up with something that has real heart and integrity,’ explains Tattie.
Her own cottage – in fact a pair of 1780s former worker's cottages that were joined together at some point – has that in spades. With its pleasing palette of earthy tones inside and the menagerie of peacocks, chickens, guineafowl and Shetland ponies roaming around outside, her charming cottage certainly looks the part. But it is about much more than the aesthetic. In fact, many of the birds – including 40 white doves that started as just four – were presents the couple gave each other over the years, representing moments of their lives and, in that sense, weaving their own story into the house. ‘I wanted our home to feel fun, magical and lively for my three boys and little girl,’ explains Tattie. ‘Equally, I want it to feel relaxing and embracing of the chaos of busy family life.’ From the moment you step through the gate, it’s hard not to feel the warm embrace of the house. This is a place that has come together thoughtfully and one that will continue to evolve with Tattie’s family.
The couple bought the house in the summer of 2020, moving from a house in north Dorset with their, then, three little boys in tow. ‘We were living in a miniature version of this house, but it was bursting at the seams,’ recalls Tattie. She had in fact spotted this house online in 2019 well before they were ready to sell their house; by a stroke of luck the seller had decided to wait until the spring of 2020 to sell and it just so happened to be back on the market when Tattie and Fred began their hunt in earnest. While Fred had never been particularly keen on a thatched cottage, he was immediately taken by it when they came to view – ‘he grabbed my hand as soon as we stepped into the kitchen and said “shall we buy it?”,’ recalls Tattie. ‘It was just the perfect location for us, surrounded by a network of tracks that mean the boys can just jump on their bikes and set off on adventures. I love that it has this tangle of wildness all around it, with wild strawberries growing up through the gravel.’
When Tattie and Fred moved in they initially changed very little. With floral projects full steam ahead across the world – Fred also works for Tattie’s business – they decided to live for a while with white walls. Long and just one room deep, the house originally would have been a pair of two-up, two-down cottages, before an extension was added to each end about 25 years ago. Downstairs, the rooms run from one to the next, with the kitchen and sitting room taking up most of the footprint. Upstairs there are five bedrooms, reached via one of three staircases – two in the main house, one in one of the extensions – although there are long-term plans to turn one of the main ones into a slide. ‘The house itself felt a bit patchworky, because some rooms felt like they’d never been touched, while others really had,’ explains Tattie, referring to the rather incongruous fitted jacuzzi bath that had found its way into one of the two upstairs bathrooms.
When they did decide to make some changes, Tattie describes it more of a case of ‘taking away rather than adding’. Fake ceilings were pulled down to reveal beams, which they painted, carpets and lino were taken up to reveal wooden floorboards and the all-singing whirlpool bath was swapped for a more fitting standalone tub. ‘The fireplace in the bathroom had also been covered up, so we exposed that too,’ explains Tattie, who also had brickwork in the sitting room and little dining room revealed. ‘It was about making the house feel a little more cohesive,’ she explains.
About two years ago, they made a few larger interventions. One of the extensions had been a distinct annex, but the couple had it opened up so it’s now part of the house, with a playroom downstairs and a guest bedroom upstairs. What had been a family room in the extension at the other end of the house off the kitchen became a generous utility, boot and laundry room, where the pretty pink ceiling and swathes of stripey curtains belie its supreme practicality. What had been a sliver of a boot room on the other side of the kitchen became a thin dining room, which doubles as a craft room for the children. ‘It did feel a bit like a corridor, so we just thought we’d make it feel like the most special space,’ says Tattie, who has achieved just that by painting a mural along one of the walls, created bit by bit in the evenings after her children have gone to bed from leftover tester pots. ‘I had a plan to make a structured, Swedish-inspired mural, but I then just thought I’d make it wild and looked outside for my inspiration,’ explains Tattie. ‘It’s all apple trees, hills and the birds and animals that surround us.’ In the next door sitting room, painted swallows swoop between the beams. ‘I love the idea of the inside looking like it belongs on the outside,’ explains Tattie.
The colour palette throughout reflects this love of the natural world. For someone who works with flowers, she admits that she isn’t really a fan of floral patterns, preferring to use colour in blocks. She’s drawn to rich, moody colours – warm reds and earthy greens and browns, along with warming yellows, which she has used to paint the walls of her daughter’s bedroom and the sitting room. ‘Yellow is such an important colour in nature and I love seeing flashes of it outside,’ says Tattie. Pops of electric pink – the utility room ceiling, for example, and cushions and lampshades dotted throughout – take their lead from the colour of spindleberries that grow abundantly in the garden. She likens her palette to that of an old suzani, one of which hangs resplendently above her bed. ‘I couldn’t believe my eyes when I came across it on Facebook marketplace for £40,’ she says, visibly and justly thrilled.
Much of the house has been pieced together in a similar vein, often using clever, inexpensive hacks. Rather than ripping out the existing pine kitchen, she just painted it in deVol’s ‘Refectory Red’, removed the upper units and added tongue and groove to the walls. The island she had made bespoke by a lovely man who the couple used to live near in north Dorset; she drew up the design based on a pattern that reminded her of India where she spent a formative couple of years when she was 18. In the sitting room, she zhuzhed up unremarkable pine floorboards by painting them in a white and yellow checkerboard pattern.
‘One day, we’d love to put down lovely old oak boards, but this works really well for now and provides some fun for the children,’ she explains. ‘A lot of the house was about using our imagination with what we had.’ Tattie admits that she rarely set out to find specific pieces of furniture for the house. ‘Things either find me or I come across something I like and then find a home for it,’ she says. The dining table in the kitchen is a case in point – in fact it’s the fifth table the couple have had there and came to them when a family Tattie used to nanny for years ago asked if she might like it. ‘I like to live with things that have a story behind them.’
For Tattie, the house is ‘another member of our family.’ And like all living things, she knows that the house is not fixed in aspic. ‘I want this house to be a happy, safe place for the children to grow up in,’ says the artist and designer. ‘It reflects what we need it to be right now, but that might change year on year.’
Dean Hearne1/14In the utility and boot room, curtains, made up by Tattie's mother from a fabric bought from Upstairs Downstairs in nearby Sherborne, conceal open cupboards. The worktop around the sink was made from the top of an old snooker table, which their builder happened to have.
Dean Hearne2/14Looking through into the sitting room, where Tattie had brickwork exposed and painted the blue ceiling with swooping swallows, much to her children's delight.
Dean Hearne3/14The walls of the sitting room are painted in Edward Bulmer's ‘Lute’, which ties in perfectly with Tattie's floor-to-ceiling mural in the dining room beyond.
Dean Hearne4/14Tattie found the bench seat in an antiques shop in Semley and painted it in ‘Treron’ by Farrow & Ball. The painting of a horse hanging above is also from a Semley antiques shop, while the colourful painting to the left of it is by one of Tattie's favourite artists, Frances Watts. Below that is a painting of Tattie's boys walking down the track, which she painted and gave Fred as a birthday card one year.
Dean Hearne5/14The rocking horse – nicknamed Merrylegs – was a Christening present to one of the children from a Godparent, sourced from an antiques shop.
Dean Hearne6/14In the upstairs hallway hangs a clown outfit, which Tattie has worn to many parties and in a sense represents the joyful spirit of the house.
Dean Hearne7/14A bed canopy from Dorset-based Projektityyny hangs above Tattie and Fred's daughter's bed, providing the perfect accompaniment to the walls that are painted in Farrow & Ball's ‘Trumpington Yellow’. The sleigh bed was a lucky antique find.
Dean Hearne8/14In the bedroom, Tattie and Fred swapped out a jacuzzi bath for a freestanding one, added the shower and opened up the fireplace. The walls are painted in ‘Sutcliffe Green’ by Farrow & Ball.
Dean Hearne9/14A suzani, picked up for just £40 from Facebook Marketplace provides a focal point in the main bedroom where the walls are painted in Edward Bulmer's ‘Jonquil’. The quilt on the bed is from Projektityyny.
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Dean Hearne11/14A beloved market find takes pride of place on the shelf in the kitchen.
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Dean Hearne13/14Tattie, Fred and their three boys and baby girl sit around the firepit in the garden.
Dean Hearne14/14The peacock was a present from Tattie to her husband, Fred.
