A vibrant Georgian home in West Sussex

If Paula Goodburn could bottle up the evocative aromas of South Africa, which she describes as ‘the mix of red earth warmed by intense sunshine’, she would. For now, the designer, who was born in Johannesburg but moved to Britain when she was five, transports ‘African soul’ into our homes via Porcupine Rocks, the textile design collective she founded in 2013. Specialising in work by contemporary South African designers, Porcupine Rocks showcases modern prints that are saturated with the vibrant colours of the southern continent.

Not surprisingly, colour and print play a key role in her vibrant Georgian home, a wide, red-brick rectory next to the village church and framed by smooth lawns and leaning trees – a vignette that might have come straight from the pages of EM Forster.

But while others might have deferred to the history of the house, deploying blowsy chintzes and a muted palette for a classic country-house effect, Paula saw the ‘robust bone structure and wonderful light’ of its Georgian architecture as an opportunity to let loose with ‘a myriad’ of colourful fabrics, wallpapers and paints.

‘We arrived in West Sussex from London with a treasure chest of belongings gathered from our travels, which sparked the warm, bold feel. It’s a home peppered with our stories,’ says Paula, a former TV producer, who lives here with her husband Damian and their teenagers, Scarlett and Luke.

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‘We’ve lived here for seven years and I’m forever moving furniture and pictures around – adjusting the feel of each room, working out how best to use the space. But I do have a formula and a vision of how the house will look. Although the whole family has their say. It’s a collaborative effort.’

Colour and print give the house its distinct character. In the kitchen, which was converted by previous owners from a Victorian barn, the wallpaper is by Ardmore, a Cape Town-based ‘discovery’ now represented by Cole & Son. The multi-colourway inspired the ‘zingy’ lemon paint of the radiators.

Yellow also brought the dark larder, which still has its 18th-century storage, to life. The boot room is decorated in traditional ‘back of the house’ colours. ‘I used three shades of green for the woodwork to trick the eye and soften that blocky feel,’ says Paula.

She often combines contrasting prints for upholstery. The back of a chair is often overlooked, she explains. ‘If you add a distinctive fabric it adds an element of surprise when you step into a room for the first time,’ she says, singling out a pair of mid-century eBay chairs, reinvented with fabrics by South African collective Design Team, made using traditional screen-printing methods.

She likes the way each has its own story. In one bedroom, the headboard is covered with Fabricnation’s version of a classic French toile. Instead of traditional pastoral motifs, Toile du Jozi (the local nickname for Johannesburg) teems with the capital’s taxis, buses and skyscrapers.

‘The South African design scene is incredibly diverse,’ says Paula. ‘That’s why I find it so fascinating. On the one hand there are inspiring contemporary creatives – like Mash T Design Studio. But you still find villages devoted to traditional crafts, such as pottery, basket-making, weaving, wood-carving, using skills handed down over generations.’

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The intricate Zulu beadwork necklaces, chest plates and anklets, which she has collected since she was a teenager, evolved from trading links with Europe. ‘In the 19th century merchants would swap glass beads for local commodities,’ she says. ‘You can date the pieces by the beads, the later larger ones are made from plastic beads.’

She credits her parents, both South African, with her appreciation of design. Her mother is an artist whose bright rugs and ceramics are dotted around the house, and they also ran a small antiques business. ‘We’d browse the markets and I’d be given a few pounds to start my own collections.’ When her parents moved to London, they brought their un-English ‘open-door policy’ with them, and Paula and Damian share the same outlook.

This relaxed way of living, and the importance of friends and family, was brought sharply into focus in 2016, when Paula was diagnosed with cancer. ‘They say it takes a thousand days to build a new business and I’d almost reached that milestone when I was diagnosed,’ she says. Not surprisingly, home played a large part in her recovery. In the summer the family put a bell tent up in the garden where they played cards and listened to music, ‘a bit like explorers on safari,’ she recalls.

Then one day she came home from a medical appointment to find that her girlfriends had joined forces to ‘inject colour and joy’ in the courtyard by filling it with an abundance of flowers. ‘My friends mean the world to me, they know me so well!’ These friends continue to dip in and out, says Paula. ‘There’s always somewhere to put your feet up or dance around the kitchen island. This is not a show home. It’s a home with soul.’

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