Decorating a house in the country—whether a full-time residence or a weekend retreat—offers designers the chance to conjure up a sense of escape with each decorative flourish. Such was the case for the creatives featured here, who fashioned transporting environments using colour, pattern and artistic touches—including hand-painted tiles boasting illustrated motifs. Unlike plain tiles or those with uniform patterns, these decorative elements tell a visual story that can connect a home with its surroundings or call to mind far-off places.

For interior designer Nadine Finnegan of Decurate Interiors, the choice was about eliciting a magical quality in a weekend home in Oxfordshire, where each room was designed around an object of note. In the principal bathroom, that inspiration came in the form of Viola Lanari’s coral wall light, which Finnegan installed above a clawfoot tub before connecting the silhouette with artist Fee Greening’s Climbing Curios wallpaper and tile collections, left. The pattern boasts illustrations of sea and meadow motifs that nod to Greening’s own countryside retreat near the Dorset coast. “They’re nature’s curiosities,” she says.

The delicacy of Greening’s original watercolours reference medieval alchemical drawings and illuminated manuscripts, lending them that sense of wonder Finnegan was after. “Fee’s designs are otherworldly. They are utterly charming, magical and feel incredibly timeless,” she says. Adding to the enchantment, Finnegan eschewed a traditional repeat and instead spaced the tile motifs in a sporadic way that captivates the viewer.

In New York’s bucolic Hudson Valley, celebrated interiors stylist Mieke ten Have undertook her first decorating project, helping friends infuse a 1982 ranch-style house with their love of travel and European décor, whilst still feeling firmly rooted in the American landscape, centre. Ten Have, who is known for her passionate approach to collecting, sourced antique Dutch tile for the mantelpiece in the principal bedroom. Though Delftware is traditionally associated with blue and white, she selected this softer aubergine tone (an 18th century development) that features an apropos mix of flora, fauna and depictions of rural dwellings. A painting by local artist Mary Nelson Sinclair picks up the colour palette, as does the Gregory Parkinson blanket, which also nods to traditional Americana.

Back in the UK, design studio Turner Pocock opted for hand-painted tiles featuring an array of frolicking critters as the backsplash in a flower room in Berkshire, creating an instant connection to the garden just outside the back door, right. “It’s in quite a visible spot in the house, regularly walked past in the day, so it was nice to make something more it,” says principal designer Bunny Turner on the choice to commission the bespoke tiles. “They are whimsical and painterly. It’s art in tile form,” she notes. Further connecting to the home’s pastoral pleasures: a collection of hooks is used to hang everything from watering cans to strings of onions while the limestone sink features carved troughs for easy clean up. Softening it all—a pleated skirt hides clutter. 

Beyond these examples, we’ve also seen projects where custom tile motifs cite a client's personal history, like a toile de jouy down memory lane. That’s quite a lovely idea and can even be done with a bit of a wink. Some artists on our radar: slip-decorated tiles by British artist Emily Mitchell (whose early motifs depicted characters from her favourite books as Staffordshire figurines); gilded motifs by French artist Arnold d’Angler; the Delft-inspired work of Oxfordshire-based Douglas Watson Studio, and of course, the timeless hand of Agnes Emery, whose beloved company Emery & Cie dissolved last year.

Photos: Nadine Finnegan; Frank Frances, courtesy of Mieke ten Have; Alex James, courtesy of Turner Pocock