A Private View: Natasha Mann’s heroically hand-painted home in West Dulwich

As most know, if you want something done, enlist a busy person. And if ever someone could stand as proof, it would be Natasha Mann. As well as working as an artist, creating both fine artworks and interiors pieces across the world, and teaching decorative painting techniques, she is a mother of five. In short, she’s busy. Yet somehow, she has found the time to transform her family’s Edwardian house in West Dulwich, south-east London, currently on the market, from “beige and a bit boring” to an Aladdin’s cave of a richness that feels all the rarer for its being hidden in such a villagey corner of the capital. Behind the front door of this gabled red-brick townhouse on a sleepy residential street is a trove of painted treasures – ceilings, borders, panelling, furniture – of exquisite perfection, executed whenever she can grab a moment. “Luckily, I’m a bit of a night owl.”

The kaleidoscopic tessellations of shape and colour that define much of her work are deeply rooted in the decorative-arts traditions of Morocco, a country she has loved since her teens. But her well of inspiration runs deep, something her love of research allows her to revel in. Here, for instance, Natasha’s interest in Eastern European folk art, deepened on a trip to Poland last year, finds expression in floral motifs, while her love of the Arts and Crafts movement comes to the fore in the serpentine, Nouveau-ish repeats of many of her borders.

With all the insouciance of the truly talented, Natasha says that none of what she has done to the house on Hexham Road has been planned. “I’ve never approached the decoration of a room as a whole,” she says, instead finding that ideas have slowly percolated until “I decide that a room might be improved by something new.” But her relaxedness belies the intensity of the work she does. Because “I’m such a granny with computers”, Natasha draws and scales every detail by hand; she also makes her own brushes and her own egg tempera paints – though, she insists, “it’s easier than you might think.”

In fact, Natasha makes everything sound easy. This manifestation of her modesty lends itself well to such a setting – a craftsperson’s dwelling made beautiful for the sake of it, “simply made to be enjoyed,” as she says. “Art made by people for people.” And now, as she tells us, it’s time for new people to delight in it too.

Natasha Mann: “Naturally, as an artist, I have always decorated the spaces I’ve lived in, but I’ve never done as much as I have here. We bought the house in 2016, but I only really started decorating in earnest during lockdown, when I had a bit more time on my hands – and fewer children! But since then, I’ve continued to add bits here and there when I’ve been inspired to. It’s been quite organic – there’s been a lot of trying things out and playing with colours. Naptime has always been a godsend when it comes to getting things done.

“The first thing I did here was the hallway. I had always wanted to paint a geometric ceiling there, something that spoke to my love of Morocco, where I spent a year learning traditional decorative painting when I was 19. That apprenticeship, which I did in Fez, was formative. It was rigorous too; I was taught not just how to create the designs, but also how to make my own stencils and paintbrushes. I’ve carried on doing that, as well as making my own paints. I love the connection it gives me to my work. Grinding the pigments, making the tempera with egg yolk and vinegar, preparing the boards and priming them with rabbit-skin glue: they’re all part of the creative process. They’re important too; many of us have lost the connection to our materials that historically would have been the standard.

“Paints made using your own pigments are also often cheaper than shop-bought ones and the results are, in my view, so much more alive. I find that different pigments have different personalities – some are harder to work with, some come on thicker, some thinner, some go on like velvet yet, when you peer closer, will have grains of texture in them. I love what each can bring to a painting.

“Oddly enough, though you’d think I learned about geometry in Morocco, in fact that came when I studied at the Prince’s (now King’s) School of Traditional Arts. And while of course Moroccan and Islamic art more broadly is very geometric, ultimately geometry is universal: it’s seen in visual culture all over the world. Because it’s not didactic or in any way figurative, it can be appreciated by everyone. Even my babies have liked it; I’ve painted the nursery’s ceiling with a star-studded geometric pattern, like a sky, for them to gaze at when they’re in their cot.

“Morocco, which has such a rich and thriving decorative arts tradition, started me off on my journey as an artist, but in the years I’ve been working I’ve realised that every culture has its own version. I’m particularly interested in Eastern European folk painting at the moment, and I’ve been exploring Medieval English wall paintings too; in fact, I chose our sitting-room curtains because their motif reminded me of one. I like that they’re in stylistic conversation with my art. I want things to work together, which is why I think my paintings feel right in this Edwardian house, with its Arts and Craftsy tiles and fireplaces.

“In keeping with that, we have reinstated the front door’s stained glass, which had been replaced by ugly frosted panels, and in the bathroom we added another window, using a brilliant local company called Art by Glass. I’d already done the ceiling in that room – a Moroccan pattern – and it was important to me that the glass resonated with that geometry, so I copied a motif from a fountain in the Alhambra. I love the way the light makes the gold leaf glow.

“Every painting in here has been made for this house, but the beauty is that they will hopefully have a life beyond it too. Unlike a mural on a wall, which may be painted over, these are, in the Moroccan tradition, all on removable wooden panels. They exist independently of the building – you could remove them and put them somewhere else, you could frame them or turn them into other paintings. I hope that, even if someone didn’t want them, they could go on to bring joy somewhere else.”

Further reading

Natasha Mann’s website

Natasha Mann on Instagram