Become a Creator today!Start creating today - Share your story with the world!
Start for free
00:00:00
00:00:01
Annie Sloan and the Joy of Paint and Colour
233 Plays4 days ago
Annie Sloan is one of the most influential figures in interior design and decorative painting. An artist, inventor, educator, and entrepreneur, she has spent over three decades helping people rediscover creativity and self-expression—making the world more colorful, one brushstroke at a time.
In 1990, Annie revolutionized the DIY world with her invention of Chalk Paint™—a versatile, fast-drying paint that adheres to almost any surface without sanding or priming. It gave people permission to be bold, to transform old furniture, and to embrace creative freedom.
Today, Annie Sloan Interiors remains a family-run business based in Oxford, England, where Annie continues to lead with heart and innovation. Her line now includes richly pigmented Wall Paint and Annie Sloan Satin Paint for smooth, soft-sheen finishes on wood and metal.
Author of 27 books and a global authority on design, Annie’s work is rooted in art history and shaped by global decorative traditions. In 2023, she was awarded a CBE for her outstanding contributions to interior design.
But Annie’s legacy is about more than accolades—it’s about empowerment. She believes everyone can reclaim their creativity and make sustainable choices that bring new life to their homes.
We’re thrilled to welcome Annie Sloan to the ReBloom Podcast. Listen in as we explore her inspiring journey—and why she believes everyone can find their own authentic path.
Thank You to Our Sponsors: Jet Creative and UrbanStems!
· Jet Creative: A women-owned marketing firm committed to community and empowerment. Whether you’re launching a podcast or building a website, Jet Creative can help you get started. Visit JetCreative.com/Podcast to kickstart your journey!
· UrbanStems: Your go-to source for fresh, gorgeous bouquets and thoughtful gifts, delivered coast to coast. Treat yourself—or someone you love—with 20% off! Use code BLOOMBIG20 at checkout.
Website: www.anniesloan.com
Instagram:https://www.instagram.com/anniesloanhome/
Recommended
Transcript
00:00:01
Speaker
Hey everyone, welcome to Rebloom, the podcast where we explore the power of change, rediscovery and living with intention. That's right. We're your hosts, Lori and Jamie, two friends who really love a good story about transformation.
00:00:16
Speaker
In each podcast, we're going to chat with inspiring guests who've made bold pivots in their lives or careers. They've let go of what no longer serve them to embrace something more authentic, joyful and true to who they really are.
00:00:31
Speaker
And the best part, many of them reconnect with passions or dreams they discovered as kids. It's about finding the seeds planted long ago and letting them bloom again.
00:00:43
Speaker
So if you're ready for real conversations about reinvention, purpose, and following your creative heart, you're in the right place. Let's dive in and see what it takes to re-bloom.
00:00:56
Speaker
Oh my gosh. Our listeners are in for an incredible treat with this conversation with the Annie Sloan. i got to meet her recently and I want to be her, her new best friend because we're, we're both research gurus and nerds and love to do deep dives into color.
00:01:17
Speaker
And she has built a business around that, an incredible business and and An incredible business. And listeners, this is something, this is an episode that you absolutely don't want to miss. She's sharing her journey.
00:01:32
Speaker
She's sharing some of her challenges. um She's just the best. And what an absolute joy to speak with her. And you are going to feel like you all have a new best friend.
00:01:47
Speaker
Hello everyone and welcome to the RebloomBod podcast. I am Jamie Jamieson. and I'm Lori Siebert and we are in for a treat today. Lori. James. It's been crazy the last couple days, but here we are and we're podcasting again.
00:02:06
Speaker
We are podcasting again and so excited for today's episode. Lori, who are we welcoming on today? Well, I had the extreme pleasure of meeting this person in person recently at the gift show in Atlanta.
00:02:25
Speaker
I'm strolling along and I peer inside a showroom and there sits Annie Sloan. And she is and one of my heroes. So I just walked right in and, you know, I met her and I thought, oh gosh, I wish I could have coffee with her every week. She's amazing.
00:02:44
Speaker
So a lot of the decorative painters in the world know of Annie and the incredible paint that she created, chalk paint, which I do have some, and it's amazing paint.
00:02:57
Speaker
um But she, i did a deeper dive into her life and her life is incredibly interesting with a stint in a band. She I know. of so i know um i don't know if we'll get into that too much because we want to focus on like her life and pivots she's made. But Annie, we just want to know more about you and your your creative life and the pivots you've made and the challenges you face. So welcome.
00:03:27
Speaker
Welcome, Annie. Thank you so much. That's really lovely. What a gorgeous, gorgeous welcome. And I do remember you coming in and me just going, hello, because I recognize you immediately.
00:03:37
Speaker
so good, good to speak to you. and i love what you're doing because, yes, I think the pivot idea is really important, both to women and to men. Yes, absolutely.
00:03:49
Speaker
So take us on a little journey in your life. I know that you grew up as a creative person. So maybe tell us a little bit about that. I went, you know, I've come from a fairly creative family. My father was very creative and artistic creative.
00:04:05
Speaker
open to ideas and intellectual things and talked to me about art and color and stuff from a very, very early age. And I was surrounded by it. um Then i was born I was born in Australia. I came to England, blah, blah, blah. We did lots of traveling around everywhere. So lots and lots of influences.
00:04:23
Speaker
um And then I went to art school um and I went to art school in the, I suppose, the time when the art school and the music scene was very big. It was in, ah have to say, it was quite a while ago. It was in the um late 60s, early 70s.
00:04:40
Speaker
And people now write theses and stuff about that time. You know, people like David Bowie were went to art school and then they did music. And there's an awful lot of examples like that.
00:04:51
Speaker
So I went to art school, did art, but I also was a little bit involved in music. So you just mentioned that. don't seem to be able to get away from it. But it was an important thing because it's all about creativity and it's reinventing yourself and all of that.
00:05:06
Speaker
And I think that reinventing yourself is very important. um So I did that and we were actually a really sort of quite occ cult band. And um there we are. I actually went to New York once at the university in New York and they were doing um they were interviewing me and some of my other band members about art schools in the 70s, particularly in Britain.
00:05:31
Speaker
and about the music scene. So I'm part of thesis. I mean, of course you are. course are. would not expect any less. So it's all about performance art, which I think I still find, God, how did that happen? Anyway, much later on, I then decided actually music business was great.
00:05:52
Speaker
But it was before you could do it your own. And so there was a lot of more management involved. And I'm much more too, I'm too independent for that. And so um I wanted to do more art and painting. um Not so much art, it's just paint. I really love paint.
00:06:09
Speaker
I think it's transformative in many ways. So um I ended up getting very involved in the whole idea of paint. I did a little bit of journalism after art school.
00:06:21
Speaker
um i was involved in a magazine called Time Out, which actually was in America at one point, just in New York, I think. I might have in San Francisco, too. And it was a magazine about events. And so I was involved in all of that, you know, daily events. um So um ah when i and I started doing that and that sort of got me into the whole, um what where else you could be, um not just with music, but with literature and music, and not music, with with art.
00:06:52
Speaker
And I started researching while I did this part-time job as a journalist. and um And I thought about, I want to write a book. So I wrote a book and that was transformative again, because I wrote this book about decorative painting because I was doing sort of to get money, um murals and things for people in London.
00:07:15
Speaker
And I was meeting all these amazing men who, may all men, um who were what we call painter and decorators. I think in America you call them something else, and I've forgotten.
00:07:26
Speaker
But they're this average guy who's going to paint your house. But this was in the high end, and so they would be doing marbling and wood graining and all that fabulous stuff.
00:07:37
Speaker
And I started seeing them, and I thought, these guys are going to die soon. They're amazing. Mainly, um they're not they're not authors or writers. And so I thought this is going to be a great thing to write about. So I started trying to get a book together.
00:07:52
Speaker
I eventually bought out a book called The Complete Book of Decorative Paint Techniques. And that was done in 1989, I think it was, so a long time ago. And that sold incredibly well.
00:08:04
Speaker
I think we sold something like 2 million copies worldwide. Wow. Wow. why wow um And that was caused before the internet. You couldn't get this information anywhere else other than a book. And we went 11 languages. Incredible. Wow. Wow. And and that, yeah, it it was amazing. And so that led me on to um working and thinking about other areas of decorative painting, not just walls and fancy houses, but I got more and more interested in normal, ordinary people.
00:08:36
Speaker
What did they do? How did they paint? And ah looked at actually America was my first influence because you had all that, um ah america ah what's it called?
00:08:48
Speaker
Pennsylvania Dutch. Yeah. well The milk paints too.
00:08:56
Speaker
all those beautiful houses in um i think it be upstate connecticut and massachusetts and new and i thought this was really interesting In searching for that, researching, I found that it all came from mainly Sweden, with Germany and what have you, but a lot of it from Sweden.
00:09:16
Speaker
And that just got me on painted furniture because that was in the fancy houses and it was in the farmhouses and it was, you know, everybody. And I got so, so interested in that.
00:09:29
Speaker
So I've been looking at that. I'm a little bit nerdy. i love doing research um and looking things up. I like buying books about new and I was, you can't find any of this stuff, even on the internet today, it's difficult to find.
00:09:43
Speaker
So what I bought was a load of old books about marbling, wood graining, what they did, um whatever. Um, And so I got into it.
00:09:54
Speaker
And one way or another, there's a long way to explain to you that 35 years ago, i made my own paint. And that was in response to the Swedish painted furniture and everything else that I've found since.
00:10:12
Speaker
And I was in my early forty s How about that? so So we read in your bio that it was through a chance encounter in Holland that that happened.
00:10:24
Speaker
So can you tell us about what what happened and how that how that began? Yeah, chance encounters are great, aren't they? So there I was in, I was teaching around the place and I'd been asked by somebody in the Netherlands to come and teach. so I went to Utrecht and we taught teaching some basic ideas about painting furniture.
00:10:46
Speaker
ah didn't have my own paint at that time, so it was very difficult to get the right stuff, but I knew what I wanted to do. and I met this man who was on my workshop and he said, i think I might have said I'd love to make my own paint. And he sidled up to me and said, I heard you say you wanted to make your own paint. Well, I know a paint factory.
00:11:09
Speaker
oh Whoa, okay. So I don't remember whether it was the next day or the next week, and we went to Belgium. So from Utrecht in Holland, in the Netherlands, we went to this amazing paint factory.
00:11:22
Speaker
And there I met a wonderful, small, independent paint manufacturer who was interested in what I had to say. That's amazing. So I don't believe in chance. I think that was all meant to be.
00:11:35
Speaker
It all came together. So I want to go back just a little bit. So the the mural painting and the decorative painting techniques, that was born out of you needing...
00:11:48
Speaker
to make money in some way and were doing a mural painting, but was your earlier work, the earlier art that you were making, was it also related to that somehow? um Well, what you mean when I was at art school? Yes. Yes.
00:12:01
Speaker
Art school was completely different. So art school was at that time, and it probably still is, is really quite conceptual and a bit more about, um ah Yeah, concepts. And it's not terribly painterly.
00:12:15
Speaker
And it was partly me wanting to get back into paint. But when I was doing my my degree show, you had to end up doing a whole show with your paint about what your show was about. And I did stuff with...
00:12:28
Speaker
I was very interested. It sounds weird because I don't like tattoos now, but it was about tattoos and about people making symbols and stuff. And so there were big figures that I made, like figures of Atlas and figures of the world.
00:12:44
Speaker
I've always been interested in the world and they had, and and there were ideas of, you know, I love mum. Do you remember that? Yes. Oh, yeah. mom Maybe mum or an anchor and hula hula girls.
00:12:58
Speaker
I just thought they were really interesting symbols. So that was what my work was about. Very, very different. But I was always interested in feet on the ground. What was it about? you know why do people want to do stuff?
00:13:10
Speaker
Oh, that's interesting. Well, I kind of see a little bit of a relationship because tattoos are about symbols and the Pennsylvania Dutch and the Swedish, yeah they are they're very symbol oriented. And I'm attracted that too. And I also know you love the Bloomsbury group and Charleston house, which I absolutely adore.
00:13:33
Speaker
So all of those influence came to be in your world of of creating paint. yeah Yes, exactly. And I've also got a lot of interest in different people around the world because I'm a big mixture of people.
00:13:47
Speaker
And so that also, i and I've always felt somebody from the world, not someone who is just... English or Australian. I'm born in Australia, but I don't feel particularly, I feel everything.
00:14:01
Speaker
Yeah. yeah, connects it to everything. So, Annie, you have this beautiful quilt of music and art and everything that's come together, and you've written a beautiful book, and you're in your mid-40s, and you found a paint company, and then you say, going to start a paint company?
00:14:19
Speaker
I mean, that's, that's... That's a big deal. i mean, that's what, what was what, how did that start? What was the seeds of inspiration to get that going? Well, I've been doing, as I say, a lot of in a lot of research and I knew about different sorts of paint.
00:14:34
Speaker
And I had already bought some furniture and I was trying to paint it in what you would call acrylic paints. And I couldn't do what I wanted. One, the colours were wrong. They were too harsh, too bright, too clean.
00:14:48
Speaker
I couldn't mess them up. I couldn't merge them. um art I couldn't use... um Oil paint takes too long to dry. You need something quick in my sort of life, our lives too quick.
00:15:03
Speaker
um ah This is before children at that point I was painting, trying to paint furniture. So I've been looking and researching and trying to find what did they paint? Why did their paintings look so beautiful?
00:15:16
Speaker
So when you look at Swedish furniture, that's beautiful. Why were mine looking so yucky, really yucky? You know, the the green was too bright, all of that.
00:15:27
Speaker
So I started to research that. and um And I think if you've been a painter, you've been trained as a painter, you're used to taking an idea and developing it.
00:15:38
Speaker
And I think that's a lot to do with why I did it. i I mean, I wasn't making a business plan. I was not making a business plan. At that point, I had never heard of a business plan. No idea.
00:15:53
Speaker
So um when I started to make it into a business, again, I didn't know what I was doing. And I was told to make a business plan. If you want, I'll tell you what I think about business plans.
00:16:05
Speaker
Go ahead. Okay, well, um I was amazed because I was told, i was going, they were saying, so what do you expect to make in the first year? What do you expect to make in the second year?
00:16:17
Speaker
What are your overheads? What are your whatever, all the rest them? I'm like, the answer to all of these questions is I don't know, which is true of anybody who starts a business. Unless they've already got something set up, you have no idea.
00:16:33
Speaker
And they said, which still makes me laugh, oh, just make it up, it doesn't matter. ah but What's the point? Why are you asking? are you asking? Yeah.
00:16:45
Speaker
So, um and I do think this is a bit of a problem, um especially with people like myself who have a vision. i had a very big vision. i knew exactly. No, I didn't exactly know what I wanted, but I had a vision of what it would be. And I knew that how you, what I wanted to do.
00:17:02
Speaker
and I knew how much people would love it. I think I, my idea was that everybody's creative And these are the tools. You need some things that are easy.
00:17:13
Speaker
I wanted to make a paint that you didn't have to prime or sand. I wanted to make a paint that you can mix the colours so there'd be no black in it. um I wanted to make a paint that would stick to anything, um would dry quickly.
00:17:27
Speaker
had all of those ideas and would have lots of techniques. Now, if I said that to, ah say, a bank manager, that would be like completely over their head. It wouldn't mean a thing.
00:17:38
Speaker
So um I've since heard ah people who give business talks, who are women who say that it was a particular woman called Trini who makes makeup. And she said, if you go to a man and tell him that you want to do this because women will love it because they want to look younger or they want to do this, they want to do that.
00:17:59
Speaker
Nobody knows that all they want to know what, What's the turnover in the first year? What's the turnover in the third year? And that is a language I do not speak. So I've never been successful ever in raising money, ever.
00:18:15
Speaker
I just don't seem to be able to do it because... well Yeah. And I think that unfortunately, when you go in front of some people, too, they have such a narrow perspective of what um is going to be a success. I've i've listened to the lady um who started It Cosmetics, for example, and she went in front front of a venture capital person and He said, um well, no one's going to buy makeup from you because of your size.
00:18:42
Speaker
And they, yeah, uh-huh. And they don't look like you. And she walked out and she, long story short, um sold the business seven years later for like billions of dollars, billions of dollars. And the first letter she got was from that guy who said, yeah, I was wrong.
00:18:59
Speaker
And she said he bought into the beauty industry. And so I think that unfortunately, people are so closed-minded that they don't see something that's new and fresh. And especially um your paint changed changed the the way we all paint. And and in you're right, you allowed for creativity for everybody.
00:19:18
Speaker
And it's amazing. It's amazing. So thank thank you for that. It seems like part of why you developed the paint was out of your own need and knowing what what you needed and wanted. But I think what also is really smart is you were also thinking because you're a person of the world,
00:19:39
Speaker
what other people might want and making it very accessible to a lot a lot of people. And I think that's brilliant. Well, it was just by chance, really, because it is exactly what I want to do. i love the idea that other people are creative.
00:19:56
Speaker
I think loads of people are creative in their own ways, different ways. We're all different in different ways and we're all at the journey in different ways. So now I go on Instagram and I see people using paint that I would like, oh, no, I don't like that at all.
00:20:10
Speaker
But I don't say that is disgusting. I go, well, maybe you're at a different part of the journey. You know, you might be up here or down there or to the side or whatever, but we're it's all valid and you're all we're all doing what we want.
00:20:26
Speaker
and And you should be able to do that. And I just thought that that was a possibility. And I always think that if I like it, other people will like it because I'm really quite ordinary. I mean, you know, you don't want to say to, you know, I don't think I'm extraordinary and different.
00:20:42
Speaker
You know, I think if you, yeah, that's- Yeah, and i and i and i think you you you made thats you made the paint so approachable. I am not a trained artist, um but I have adored your paint from the very, almost from the very beginning because it's so forgiving and it is for, it it allows it allows you to be creative and um and it is for for everyone. And so I think that that that's what makes it unique and yeah.
00:21:11
Speaker
Well, I made it. Sorry, I'm just going to say one thing. You're right. um It's very forgiving, but it's not just forgiving for someone who is new to it. It's also forgiving yeah for me.
00:21:22
Speaker
i can change my mind. that's important. I love that. Got to love that about any kind of art supply because we do change our mind. Yeah. And you can create and you can add and it makes it unique. And I love i love that about the paint. Yeah.
00:21:39
Speaker
Let's take a quick minute and thank our amazing sponsors. Our podcast is proudly brought to you today by Jet Creative and Urban Stems. Jet Creative is a women owned marketing firm committed to community and empowerment since 2013.
00:21:56
Speaker
Are you ready to rebloom and build a website or start a podcast? Visit jetcreative.com backslash podcast to kickstart your journey. They will help you bloom in ways you never imagined.
00:22:10
Speaker
And bonus, our listeners get an exclusive discount when you mention rebloom. And a huge thanks to Urban Stems, your go-to and our go-to source for fresh, gorgeous bouquets and gifts delivered coast to coast.
00:22:25
Speaker
Use Bloom Big 20 and save 20% on your next order. And don't forget to subscribe to this podcast and follow us on Instagram and Facebook at ReBloom Podcast. Thanks to our sponsors and thanks to you for joining us today.
00:22:43
Speaker
So we we like to talk also about you' you've made this change. You're you're starting a paint company. And you mentioned that part of the challenge is involved raising money and speaking the language of the bankers.
00:22:58
Speaker
Like when you launched, did you launch with a certain number of paints and was there a capital investment or were there other challenges? Can you talk a little bit about that? Well, I didn't um have any money to invest at all.
00:23:12
Speaker
um And luckily I started the business with someone who wanted not to invest money, but time. So I had someone in Belgium, he Netherlands and Belgium,
00:23:26
Speaker
And he wanted to invest time. He thought it was a great idea and he started selling it and selling it in various shops. So he didn't put any money into it. I didn't put any money into it. But with those two things, myself and this lovely man called Yoris, he and I and the paint company launched.
00:23:45
Speaker
And the the paint company, we didnt we didn't make much paint to begin with. And so they didn't invest much. There were 12 colors. They're all traditional colors, Swedish sort of colors um and um sort of quite traditional.
00:24:03
Speaker
And so we launched those 12 colors and we started selling them mainly in the Netherlands, but also in England and then ah in Spain. So that's where we started right to begin with.
00:24:15
Speaker
And that went really, really well. But I didn't have any money and i just did it. And there was no Internet. So I used to try to sell it to tell people about it in magazines and what have you. That was really hard. So I've always been interested in the marketing.
00:24:29
Speaker
The marketing, I call it is communication because that's all I'm doing. I'm communicating it. And I had, um and when I sold it in England, I sold it through a small shop called Relics, who I'm still selling my paint through them today.
00:24:44
Speaker
And Relics then um employed some some ah salesman. I don't think they employed him again. He was doing it on commission only. And he started selling it.
00:24:55
Speaker
So it was all done on, um yeah, just people... just sort of believing in it. i mean I've always said I'm quite lucky I have sort of angels. I mean, I'm not airy-fairy, but I sort of, you know, if you've got a good story and it's real, i think that helps.
00:25:15
Speaker
I agree. I agree. yeah So along the way, you've you're coming out with your 27th book, I believe. So you're writing books all along the journey.
00:25:26
Speaker
And was that part of the communications and the way you were reaching people? Well, to begin with, I wrote the books before my paint came out. So I was already painting. So when I was painting writing those books, that complete book of decorative paint techniques was before my book, but before the paint.
00:25:45
Speaker
um it was all about techniques and stuff and it was all about oil paint at that point as well so it was before but then because I'd already established my name I was able to write books about my paint or about the paint techniques not so much about my paint but about the techniques we use my paint yeah so I've yeah um it's very nice of you to mention I have my The 27th book coming out a month. How about that?
00:26:17
Speaker
the It should be out on the 8th of April. So it's about six weeks to come. And I just bought bunch. When I saw you the gift show, I bought a bunch of your quarterly publications, which are gorgeous. They're so beautiful. I couldn't decide which ones.
00:26:36
Speaker
I had to have them all. So i I got all of them when I was there. they are i i mean, I shouldn't say that because um they are really good. They are very good. Each one is a color and we concentrate.
00:26:49
Speaker
Yeah, that's the colorist. It's actually twice a year we do them. Oh, okay. yeah yeah And if you're a color lover, you just, yeah, I had to have them. Like you, you love color. and but we yeah I think we're we're all we're all such color lovers. And so Annie, you opened the door to this new paint company.
00:27:09
Speaker
But yet often when you open the door to one thing, other things happen. So as Laurie was just asking you, the books, teaching, um what other things happened as you, you know, you were selling paint, but then your career evolved and changed and has grown from that in the past 25 years? What are some of the other blessings and things that have happened along the way?
00:27:32
Speaker
um Oh, blessings. Gosh, well. Yeah. Or challenges, either one. Loads of challenges. Loads of challenges. Yeah. I'll talk about, I mean, the the the the great positive things have been that I have, um we're we're all over the world now where we sell our painting. I think it's, um 52, 56 countries, something like that. Wow. wow um We sell everywhere. We make the paint here now in England.
00:28:03
Speaker
um Where I'm sitting, right ah ah right behind the computer, is... um is the factory, which is incredible. I mean, that's something that I'm incredibly proud of.
00:28:15
Speaker
can't quite believe it. you built your You built your own factory. We built our own factory. Wow. That's a huge pivot. Yeah. yeah That's huge. Well, it was very, very important. and My husband made me do that. Well, made he did it. I was very scared to But it does mean you have ultimate control because what happens is that all the paint factories we've been with, they'd say,
00:28:39
Speaker
Oh, um well, they never said it. You just find that that blue was not quite the blue that it used to be. And they go, no, no, we've not changed anything at all.
00:28:51
Speaker
You know, yes, you have. No, no, we haven't. nope No, no. ah And so you don't have control. I wanted my paint to have no black in it. And they'd say, we've made it with no black. And then I'd see, yes, there's black in it.
00:29:03
Speaker
I can tell because when you add white to the paint, you'll see it's got a grayness to it. no You know, we have a saying in England, I'm not as cabbage as, no, I'm not as green as I'm cabbage looking.
00:29:19
Speaker
So um they could tell me that, but I knew that they put black in it. There lots of other things. Sometimes the quality wasn't so good. Maybe they had skimped on something. So anyway, we made our own and that's made a huge difference.
00:29:33
Speaker
We only make it in, we make it in South Africa. in another factory because the rand is low and so ah challenging. So we make it in England now for the rest of the world. So everything you buy will be um from made in England. Next to my factory, we test it every batch we make. We do three batches.
00:29:56
Speaker
through it, check that we've got the right color, that it's got the right consistency. We test it for loads of different things. and so And we keep a little bit aside to make certain that if someone comes back to us and says, your batch number 5432, doing this. And you oh, just have look.
00:30:12
Speaker
it's not.
00:30:15
Speaker
no it's not And that can be very awkward for some people because they say, yes, it doesn't work. Well, you think, well, did you let it freeze? Are you keeping it in a hot cupboard or what are you doing? So we check it.
00:30:31
Speaker
um So, yeah, we make it ourselves. That's been an amazing thing. How long ago did you do that? I'm really bad with time, but it's probably about six years ago. oh so not so long ago. It's long before. How long is COVID again? 5.20.20.
00:30:49
Speaker
five Oh, well, then it's probably about eight years ago in that case. It was a long it was a good few years before COVID. um And we were so busy through COVID as well because of that and we kept making it madly.
00:31:01
Speaker
Oh, yeah. So the factory's been amazing. um Being just really pretty successful has been amazing. um And I got, um i think one of the things that I like the most, well, not the most, it's not the most at all, was,
00:31:19
Speaker
One is getting the CBE, which is very high um award from the king. Oh, wow. That got two years ago, which is amazing. It's the CBE, Commander of the British Empire.
00:31:30
Speaker
it's It's incredible. Wow, that's incredible. Yeah. Well, Americans may not know, English people will know. um It's a very high honor. That's a very big honor. yeah Congratulations.
00:31:43
Speaker
and i Thank you. I'm always meeting people and they burst into tears and they hug me and burst into tears. Wow. So I make people cry. But in a good way. Yeah. but I think I probably maybe teared up a little bit when I saw you were sitting in there. i'm like, what?
00:32:02
Speaker
I find that really bizarre because I'm just, I don't get it. But anyway, that's very, very nice. um It's been very challenging over the years as well because every person, every, well, every every man and his dog, as I say, has made a chalk paint. And it's not chalk paint.
00:32:20
Speaker
They don't get it. They don't understand. My paint is completely different to anybody else's. um They get to, some people who get to a fair approximation, but I've got some secrets that they don't know. And it just is a better paint that I make for what I want it to be.
00:32:39
Speaker
Now, there are other paints now which they say, but I want a smooth paint. You can make my paint smooth if you know how to paint. If you can't make my paint smooth, um There are other paints, but they'll only do smooth. I'm not really, I'm interested in a paint that does lots of different things so you can express yourself.
00:32:58
Speaker
um And I think it's a little bit like, you know, silk compared to a sort of a nylon, you know, nylon will do everything. it doesn't crinkle. It doesn't do certain things, but it doesn't do the things that silk does.
00:33:13
Speaker
So it's amazing. You have truly an artistic paint because it allows for just wonderful flexibility. And I think that it to your point, it it lets the artist or the novice really explore and find, know,
00:33:28
Speaker
you know, what, what works best for them and for their project. And that's the beauty of that, of your page. Exactly right. Yes. So if you want smooth, you get smooth. If you want yeah and textured, you get that. You can do anything.
00:33:40
Speaker
You can do anything with it. What I love about the conversations we have on this podcast is like in your wildest dreams, would you have pictured this is where your life would have headed you? no, yeah no. Like when you were that, that girl in the, but the band. Yeah.
00:34:00
Speaker
It's so crazy to me how just chance encounters and, you know, you being a research nerd, which I also am that going down a rabbit hole and exploring.
00:34:12
Speaker
It's something that really tugged at you or you had a passion for. And then turning that into a business is really beautiful. Yeah. Can I just say, though, that um it was chance.
00:34:27
Speaker
But I did have a plan. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah. What do they say when luck meets opportunity? or Be ready when the luck happens. Yeah, be ready when opportunity. I don't know. Something about luck and opportunity. Ah, yes, you're ready when the luck happens. That's very nice. I like that idea.
00:34:47
Speaker
Ina Garten said that, and I love that because you worked really, really hard and at each pivot point along the way. You didn't just build a a a new plant.
00:34:59
Speaker
I mean, that took many years to get to where you are, but yeah you know it's interesting. Sometimes I think, and that's what we try to encourage our listeners, follow that passion from the beginning. You may not...
00:35:12
Speaker
in the very, very seat of that inspiration, know where it's going to take you. But to your point, if you start to have a plan, if you start to think about it and reach for it, it, it sometimes comes up, it it happens, it ha it happens, but you have to reach, you have to have a little bit of a plan to know going. did have quite a strong plan actually.
00:35:32
Speaker
yeah It wasn't to make money. it wasn't to have what I've got now. Um, But it was to um it was to do um do something that achieved something.
00:35:45
Speaker
it was So I wanted to be able to paint and have a business. That was my actually the real germ of what I wanted, to be able to paint, look after my children and have a lovely house and and be able to paint.
00:36:03
Speaker
That was the idea. And it needed to be sustainable so that I could make money as well, and but also be creative. And so that's always been the germ of it.
00:36:15
Speaker
And then as you go, you ah sort of adjust it. And then you go, well, to do this better, it would be good to have the factory whatever, all sorts of things. And I'm about to make a new adjustment to that. I don't know what it will be yet, but my husband and I are going to sit down together and work out because now we've got to a certain age where um I'm sure viewers can work out or listeners can work out.
00:36:39
Speaker
So i I'm not, I've got no plans to stop, but I do have to think about where we're going yeah and how I want it to be. And so, you know, it's some that another time now, as there have been along the way all the time.
00:36:54
Speaker
Are remember your children involved in the business? Not really, sort ah of and not really. So I've got our three sons. um One who's a traveler and a teacher. He's traveling around the world at the moment um and he on a motorbike.
00:37:11
Speaker
So he's going to do that for the next two years. I've got another son who's a musician and he also runs a small, um small at the moment, but maybe big in the end. um Art School for Children with his girlfriend, his partner. Oh, Love it. And another one who is um ah pretty successful musician, writer and um composer. and And so he's doing that. But he's also a designer. So they, you know, whatever.
00:37:38
Speaker
so all creative. All creative. Yeah. Is your husband also? He's very, very supportive. He did sciences and maths.
00:37:50
Speaker
He's a very different logical thinker. He's everything that I'm not. I can relate to that. I think behind every person who is creative, you know, to do well, you need someone who's ah clear thinker.
00:38:05
Speaker
Yes. I do tend to get, like many people, I think, sometimes I think artistic, autistic, I don't know what. ah Yeah. I get quite wound up and and difficult to convey.
00:38:19
Speaker
work out what I who I am and what I am and so um it's someone who goes hold on carry on you know yep listens listens listens and sorts me out a little not sorts me out and she never tells me what to do he just listens yeah that helps hugely but it's great to have that sounding board for sure Yeah, a sounding board is exactly right. Yeah. yeah and someone someone who still encourages you, though, and doesn't shut you down.
00:38:49
Speaker
Exactly. Very, very important. So, yeah, there's been a lot of challenges ah along the way, huge number. And there are so many, as I say, other brands out there, which is complicated. And I've had to do some legal cases, which is Nobody wants to do legal cases, I can assure you.
00:39:07
Speaker
Yeah. Those are the challenges that you don't necessarily want. Have you learned that... What have you learned about yourself along this journey? Well, ah that's a very nice question. um I think I've learned...
00:39:23
Speaker
I've learned I'm stronger than I thought I was. um Funnily enough, getting the CBE gave me, a i don't know why, i don't know why, but it gave me a huge amount of confidence.
00:39:35
Speaker
I don't know why. i just, I know that my parents, they would never have known about it They never knew about it, but they would have been so deeply proud. And I think in a way you do do everything for your parents, don't you? Yeah, you do. You want your mom and your dad to come and go, oh, well done. Yeah, so true.
00:39:54
Speaker
And I just think I've got more confident about who I am over the years, but I think that comes with age anyway. oh i agree. Yeah. You know, it does, doesn't it? It's it's very, very nice.
00:40:07
Speaker
um And post-menopause is, I just want to tell everybody out there, any woman out there, it's bliss. It's the best thing ever. People are always complaining about the menopause.
00:40:20
Speaker
Don't complain about the menopause because post-menopause is the best thing ever. So I think that equilibrium is fabulous. Absolutely. Yeah. And yeah, it's, it's, it's good. Yeah. I don't know where i was going to go with that. I think it's, oh, go ahead, Laura. I was kind just going to ask what you're looking forward to, like in this blissful post-menopausal part of your life, this chapter, this pivot.
00:40:47
Speaker
I've just come back from India with my husband. We do painting retreats in India and in England. We're looking to do some more in other parts of the world. But meantime, India is coming next year.
00:40:59
Speaker
So there'll be a retreat in India in um in February. um You can book now if you would like to, Laurie. you come And Jamie, please do come. Yes, please. Oh, my It is wonderful. And that's something that I can't wait to do next year. It's just the nicest thing ever.
00:41:19
Speaker
you stay in this wonderful fort, which is beautifully decorated. um and it's run by this lovely Englishman. Um, and it's sort of a wonderful mix of Indian and England, England. Perfect.
00:41:33
Speaker
How perfect. Lovely. I'm looking forward to doing that and more. I'm going off to Malta on Wednesday do some, uh, um, a demo to some stockists in Malta, which is lovely.
00:41:45
Speaker
um And I just, I do like traveling. I like seeing and people meeting people. no And more painting. um That's all the nice things.
00:41:56
Speaker
And just to get through business as it is, um you know, business is, many people will tell you, it's always um a challenge. It's quite challenging at the moment because there's a lot of, nobody's not sure what is happening.
00:42:12
Speaker
And so I think it's an interesting time in the world. yeah um And I'd just like to get through all of that. Yeah. Wouldn't we all? Wouldn't we all?
00:42:23
Speaker
And let's give you a little plug because just like we have re-bloomed into this podcast, you are becoming a podcaster and talking about color, which is Amazing. Want to talk about a little bit about your podcast, which love to Oh, thank you. You're very, very kind.
00:42:38
Speaker
Yeah, I'm very excited about this. It's called The Colorist, which was the same name as my magazine or bookazine. And it is ah each week, each time rather, episode, we do a color and the history behind it because my colors are not just fancy names, um but they are about a history of something. So the first ones come out.
00:43:02
Speaker
And it's um about Capri Pink and Elsa Schiaparelli and Shocking Pink. And it's a great joy for me to talk because I've got so much.
00:43:14
Speaker
I've, you know, I am a nerd about it and I know quite a lot. And it's her combination of art. And she was a bit of a surrealist and she worked with people like Dali.
00:43:25
Speaker
And, you know, it's it's terrific to be able to talk about her. And also there is a connection with India there, because if you've not been to India, you will see... If you go to Indy, you'll see everything is loads and loads of bright pink with Barcelona orange or bright orange. Oh, yummy. I know. It's gorgeous. It's so good. I so love it.
00:43:47
Speaker
And this pink is fabulous. Fabulous. Yeah. It is. So capri pink with a bright bright turquoise and a bright green and a bright... actually the color of um that sort of, oh, sort of verdigris, bright verdigris. It's so many bright colors. um And it doesn't look ugly.
00:44:07
Speaker
You know, if you said that, it sounds as though it' be like circusy or what's not. No, it's gorgeous. It's a gorgeous pink. It's a rich, it's a rich, beautiful pink, but it's bold.
00:44:17
Speaker
And I love it. It's fabulous. The next one is about pure, which is ah very different thing. And that's, we talk about Ciri Morn. who is an American decorator. And that is, and that's the first, well, I'm not going to give it away. Okay. wait I can't wait. We can't wait. Oh my gosh.
00:44:35
Speaker
Well, and then there's another thing that we haven't talked about. So I do want to just um talk about another one of the products you have. So you started with the chalk paint, but you've also moved on to wall paint. And I'm very excited because I'm doing a little renovation and I'm already picking out my colors.
00:44:50
Speaker
ah But can you tell us a little bit about what brought you into wall paints? Yeah. and Well, you see, for me, everything touches everything else. You can't just have furniture paint.
00:45:02
Speaker
You've got to have a wall paint. So you could use chalk paint for your walls. But if you've got children or it's a kitchen or it's where there's people touching it, you need something which is strong.
00:45:12
Speaker
And I was a great believer in some really strong colors. So I've brought out this wall colors. So I've got colors like shinkle green, which is a bright, bright green. um named after a 19th, 18th, 19th century German painter, not painter, architect, who used these bright colours.
00:45:33
Speaker
I'm going to do a podcast about him. And so bright greens and lots of bright colours, as well as some creamy whites and stuff like that. But it's all, um so I just wanted to do those and that they would work, harmonise with my chalk paint colours.
00:45:51
Speaker
We'll all be part of the same thing. I've been wanting to do a mural in my dining room, so I will look into those. Well, we've got little pots as well, little cans. Perfect. So you can do that. oh that would be a lovely idea. Yeah.
00:46:06
Speaker
Yeah, I'm waiting till my husband's out of town. I'll just surprise him when he comes home. yeah Maybe Lori can come do that. I have a a eighteen ninety s Victorian home that I and I was just thrilled seeing those colors because they are so they're traditional, but yet they're fresh and they're beautiful. So I think they will be perfect.
00:46:26
Speaker
Exactly. My house is actually eighteen ninety s or so maybe 1880s. I'm not sure. But it's Victorian. And I've got, um yeah, very bright. I've got shinkle green walls.
00:46:38
Speaker
Oh, boy. Blue walls. And yeah, lots of bright colours. Love it. Love it. Well, we love color. We love joy. um this oh my gosh, Annie, this has just been an amazing conversation. Lori, what else do you want to ask Annie? I don't want to let her go. Well, we always wind up asking for that little piece of advice that you might want to share with our listeners about pivoting and making changes or about living authentically.
00:47:07
Speaker
Oh, I love authentic. That's really nice. Yeah, do you've got to be who you are. Don't pretend you're somebody else. um I meet people all the time when I'm teaching and going around. On Saturday, I met a woman who said she'd been an accountant for years.
00:47:22
Speaker
And now she's given that all up and she's now come back to where she loved to live and she feels it like she's her own self again. And she started to paint and this was her first workshop to get her on the next journey. And she's so enjoying it. She said, I'm not artistic, but I love doing this. And I said, in that case, you'll do well.
00:47:42
Speaker
I think you do what you're good at. And if you're good at communicating, be a communicator. um If you're good at painting, I mean, you're never good at one thing. You're always good at several things and put them all together and mix it and make do what you want. And and don't try to, you know, be and don't think that you have to be certain thing.
00:48:04
Speaker
You know, there's many ways to be creative. There are many ways to be successful. I mean, success can be money, but it can be something else as well. yeah It can be just having a very nice life. ah I'm not saying that you should have, I'm not advocating poverty. I'm certainly not doing that. um I'm just saying that you can have a life which is quite, which is lovely without being very rich financially.
00:48:33
Speaker
That's all. Right. And I've been through some very hard times when I thought I was going to leave my house because really when you're building a business, these things happen.
00:48:45
Speaker
So I was building my house, building the business. And I did at one point think, oh, my God, we're going to lose the business. This is many years ago and I'm going to lose everything.
00:48:56
Speaker
And I remember, i remember standing at home, I was just about to make a cup of tea. And I said to my husband, well, do you know, we're very lucky because what we have, we're very rich in ideas.
00:49:11
Speaker
And I hope that doesn't sound too schmaltzy or too yucky. But, you know, i could work in a florist or in a in a garden center wouldn't have much money, but I'd be very happy possibly um to do that. And, but I've got lots of ideas. So I love to listen podcasts.
00:49:35
Speaker
Yeah. mean I like to read books. i can paint, i can do all of those things. And, you know, you don't need much money for it. um I do want certain things though. And I do want to be comfortable in that.
00:49:47
Speaker
I don't want to be cold. I don't want to be whatever. I do think when you're a creative person, you always tend to have not only a plan B, but a plan C, a plan D. yeah Like you can keep coming up with a new plan yeah whenever you need to, and you can pivot whenever you need to, or when you want to.
00:50:09
Speaker
That's a very good point. And maybe that's the problem. I know some people just freak. They can't. What am I going to do if I don't have a job, if I don't? Or no, you need a job. But how am I going to cope? And I just think.
00:50:22
Speaker
we're probably flexible enough to be able to manage to do it in lots of different ways. To your point, we're all good at many things. Yeah. yeah we We're all good at And I was thinking, I was getting the visual of your paints because each of your paints does that do things individually.
00:50:38
Speaker
But the whole premise too is, or the whole purpose is that you can mix them together. And if we take all of those unique things that make us who we are, we become more, and we mix them all together because we're good at many things, you become just uniquely amazing. And you're so good at doing that, Jamie. You're so good at wrapping that all yeah i i love I love what you do so much. I really do. And thank you.
00:51:05
Speaker
for the gifts that you have given to so many of us for so many years. And um just because you've given us the ability to be creative, you've, I mean, you have created businesses and artists artists.
00:51:20
Speaker
Just people who are hobbyists, but you you've let your passion, your gift has been a gift to so many. Thank you. Well, I'm so proud of that. I can't tell you. That's just amazing when people tell me that. It's lovely. Incredible legacy. Absolutely.
00:51:36
Speaker
Annie, thank you so much for joining us today. Thank you for letting me talk and bubble on and be... No, it's it was an honor, such an honor. And I'm so glad I wandered into that showroom. am too, Laurie. amazing. Laurie's a similar person. She does all sorts of stuff. We're next year, India. Laurie and I are going to ah look into that. That would be, and anybody else, please go. That would be amazing. I would love to just see the textiles in India. Laurie, if you don't come, I'm never going to talk to you again. You really should come. It is. We should go. We'll take Rebloom on the road. Well, thank you everyone for joining us. And until we meet again, peace, love and Rebloom. Thank you, Annie.
00:52:24
Speaker
Thank you. bye Life is too short not to follow your passions. So go out there and let your heart plant you where you are meant to be and grow your joy. We will be right here sharing more incredible stories of reinvention with you.
00:52:39
Speaker
Make sure to subscribe to our podcast so you never miss an episode of Rebloom. Until next time, I'm Jamie Jameson. And I'm Lori Siebert. Peace, love and Rebloom, dear friends.