Over the weekend, at the Dulwich Artists’ Open House, I suddenly realized that it was exactly 5 years ago at this same show that I launched the very first samples of my lampshades and cushions! In fact this Welsh Reflection design was also the very first lampshade I made. Back in 2012 I had just had my first solo show of paintings at the Jane Newbery Gallery in Dulwich Village and Jane said that she thought my Welsh Reflection painting would make a great lampshade and that if I managed to make one she’d sell it in her shop. It then took me TWO YEARS to work out how to actually make a lampshade from one of my paintings! These were the very first samples. At this point, I also hadn’t yet designed the lamp bases, so the ones in this picture were simply props I had made myself. I had wanted something simple yet striking and contemporary yet also classic on which to display the shades, but couldn’t find what I was looking for in the shops. So I bought some cheap glass lamp bases, prised of...