Original subtitles

Our country is full of incredible makers dreaming of turning their talent into

money -making careers.

It would mean everything to be able to do this full -time.

So, with a team of fantastic professional mentors... I know your

know what you're capable of doing.

I run a one -of -a -kind bootcamp, showing them how to do just that.

Perfect. My proudest moment, I'll just share that. Yes. Now I'm on my way to

catch up with those who have made their dreams come true. Hello. There he is.

Hello, mate.

I'll be hearing about their amazing achievements.

I've been able to put down a deposit on a house.

This is my full -time job.

And finding out how much money they're making.

A little bit under £40 ,000.

Around £50 ,000. £50 ,000?

Yeah. So join me and meet the fabulous makers who have transformed their lives

and made it at market.

You can kind of say I'm living the dream.

I think that's fair to say.

For so many makers, starting a business can feel completely overwhelming.

And that's exactly why I set up my bootcamp.

to help point them in the right direction.

Today, we'll be catching up with two whose incredible talents are changing

lives. Later, mentor Sharon will be finding out about artist Jill's amazing

achievements in Berkshire. I've gone from doing one to two commissions a

to three to four a week sometimes.

I think I've done about 200 commissions in the last three years.

Before that, I'll be checking in with textile weaver and part -time woven

textiles technical instructor Shiv in Brighton.

I first met her in the summer of 2024 when she came to my business boot camp

looking for help to turn a lifelong love of creativity into a long -term career.

I've always been really creative since a young age. I used to love painting with

my granddad in his little workshop.

And in school, I didn't really...

get on with academic subjects.

I struggled quite a bit because I was dyslexic, but as soon as I got in front

a loom, I just loved it so much. All the yarn and everything.

Weaving ticked all the boxes for me.

To figure out the best way of helping Shiv turn her weaving passion into a

-time job, I gave her three challenges.

First up was making a volume piece, something she could produce quickly and

for an affordable price.

She decided to create a beginner's weaving kit, which included an

manual, mini wooden loom, weaving tools and recycled yarn, priced at £28.

You get 14 balls of yarn and you can choose which yarns you want. Normally I

customers if they want a spring or an autumn and I make them from dead stock

from a yarn factory or a dye factory or from a mill.

Then I just take them over here on my little hand winder.

I went to mills and factories during my university degree and I just realised

how much weight there was in the industry and it really upset me.

So all the yarn that I use in my kit is upcycled from British mills and

factories.

Then I add the selvedge off industrial looms. So this would normally go

into the bin.

It's great for fringing.

or adding a bit of texture.

So Mill sent this to me from the bins and I just wrap it up nice and neatly.

To help Shiv develop sellable products and market them to get the sales she

needed, she was mentored by creative entrepreneur Piyush Suri.

Piyush's signature designs have been used on ceramics, tiles and fabrics,

gaining him international recognition and success.

What are your challenges? Is it as a weaver you're facing any challenge in

business or is it with selling the kit?

I would say it's probably more of the business side. I just don't know how to

get this to the right audience.

Having looked at your kit, I think there are certain ideas I think we can work

on so that it goes to the right market.

Brilliant.

While Shiv continued working on her volume piece, I wanted to check out her

second item.

Before she arrived at my boot camp, I asked her to bring along her favourite

piece. to see if what she loved creating most had money -making potential.

And she brought along a woven lobster cushion.

It's my favourite piece because it's in memory of my grandad, who loved lobster

fishing in Ireland.

He passed away and I wanted to make something in memory of him.

With material costs of around £20, along with studio costs and a three -hour

production time... Shiv gave her beautifully woven cushion an asking

£95.

I think it's a really good cushion. I really like it. But somehow I feel that

there's not enough contrast to see the details of that lobster.

Also, I feel that she should have done back and front as the same as well.

With wool and polyester velvet, I don't think they go well together.

Shiv is asking £95 for that cushion. How do you feel about that? It's an

expensive cushion.

But I can appreciate the time that's gone into making it. I think the price

okay. A handmade cushion can sell anything between £90 to £160.

If she had the front and the back as the same, she could easily charge £120 as

well. Can you give us one...

key point now that can help Shiv on her journey at the moment. What I feel that

she struggles in is creating a cohesive collection.

Every piece is beautiful, but then you can't put two pieces together and say,

oh, it's a collection.

She's not thinking in terms of interior. She's not thinking in terms of how

people buy.

Okay.

Back on the textile station, Shiv had wound all the yarns for her beginner's

weaving kit, and was testing it out.

I'm going to load the shuttle by just holding the yarn.

and then wrapping it round.

You need to make sure that you haven't got loads and loads of yarn on it.

And then you're going to pass the shuttle, running it across the stick

now turned on its side, just like that. It's really easy.

Leave a little tail, because you're going to weave that in your next line.

that shuttle back, and then you've done your first two lines of weaving.

With her pattern started, Shiv made quick progress.

There's lots of things that you can make with the weaving kit.

This is a little wall hanging that I'm making, but you can also make bookmarks

and coasters on this kit as well.

Once I've woven up to about here, I'll take it off the

loom, and then I will hang it like this, and you can hang it on your wall.

By using recycled yarns, Shiv kept her material costs low.

and gave the kit an asking price of £28.

I think it's a great product, very sellable, but however it needs a little

of adjustment.

Your number of colors, I think, far too many. I think it can be intimidating for

people who are just about to learn some new technique. If I opened that and

there was all of that in there, I'd be like, whoa. I'd put it back again.

Where do I start with this? Yeah, maybe, yeah. Yes. So priced at £28?

Yeah. What do you think? I think the price is very fair. I would even go for,

the packaging is right, I would even go for £32 or £35 as well. I think if you

can just package it in a very nice, neat box, sustainable packaging, of course,

and do a QR code instead of sending a booklet so people can download your

and then weave. That is the expensive part of the kit, actually, is the

of the booklet. So, yeah, that's a really good point.

For her first two pieces, Shiv needed to think slightly more about her potential

customers. And as the ever -changeable British weather brought a shower to the

boot camp, she and Piyush headed into a barn so he could give her a special

mentor's challenge designed to make her do exactly that.

Before you arrived here, I asked you to create a cohesive interior collection

from one of your existing throws.

Like this one, such a beautiful piece.

You have beautiful individual pieces, but you're lacking a collection which

complements with each other.

To create her new collection, Shiv designed a cushion that could be made in

different shapes and sizes to go with the throw Piyush picked out.

Finished with a recycled zip, it was made from recycled yarn, lamb's wool,

cashmere, and a recycled velvet backing.

She began by weaving a woollen pattern for the front of the cushion on her

So what I'm doing here, if I'm picking up the shaft, which I'm picking up the

cream lamb's wool, and then I've got my shuttle, which is loaded with the

mustard bread.

I'm passing it through.

Now I'm just pulling it nice and neatly.

Don't want to pull it too tight, otherwise your thumb will go into a big

triangle. So I'm making it all nice.

Then you bring down the reed, which acts like a big comb, moving it back, and

then I'm going to put the next line of the pattern in, bringing the reed back

down so it's nice and combed down, and then passing the shuttle back through to

do the next line of the pattern.

After finishing the woven woolen pattern for the front of her cushion, Shiv took

it off the loom and prepared to add a recycled zip.

I'm just pinning the zip on and I sew the zip on first and then

I will sew the backing fabric to the front of the cushion.

The last job was adding the inside of the cushion.

I think it matches my blanket with the fact that I've used the same yarn.

I think the backing fabric looks really nice and I'm really happy with the

design and how it's all come together.

Shiv was clearly a very skilled maker, and her talent, the more expensive

wool, and a three -hour make time meant her cushions weren't cheap.

She paired her square cushion with a rectangular one, but before we found out

what she was asking for them, I wanted to know if Piyush thought they worked as

a saleable collection, with the fro he picked out.

I have absolutely no doubt that you're such a good designer and your

understanding of color.

But I feel that you just need to tone it down a little bit. You could have just

given me two different color block cushions.

Yeah. But you chose the same pattern. The idea is to upsell when somebody is

buying a throw.

So they should see exactly something that complements with that.

It's always hard to play.

No, no, but okay.

You'll have a look at that, you know. I think these cushions are taking away the

attention from your throw. It's a bit too busy for you.

Yes. Yeah. If I had to push you to put a price on these pieces, what would you

say? The cushions are between 85 to about 125, depending on the size.

I think the prices are fine for me because it's wool and it's handmade.

I think clothes are perfectly good prices.

Shiv had bags of talent, and to help her turn that into a profitable business,

we gave her an action plan to take back to Brighton.

First, she needed to create a new collection of products.

with fewer colors and patterns that would appeal to the broadest possible

market.

Next, we wanted her to lose the velvet and use a matching fabric on the front

and backs of her cushions.

Finally, she needed to overhaul her weaving kits by including fewer colored

yarns, improving the packaging and replacing the printed instructions with

digital QR code to make them more saleable and profitable.

For the next two months, Shiv had Piyush's continued support as she worked

boost her business.

But just days after leaving the boot camp, she got married.

After a short break, she got back to her studio and created a new, simpler

beginner's weaving kit, and also started to produce new patterned cushions

without velvet as part of a new collection.

This will be the front, and then...

The back will be like this, so it kind of gives my customers the opportunity to

have two different cushions in one.

Shiv was firing on all cylinders, but with her new patent cushions in

on the loom, there was a problem.

We've got an air leak in one of the pipes, so I can't actually finish what I

weaving. Obviously, running a small business, you have a lot of ups and

It might set me back a little bit, but we're here for the journey.

The loom breakdown meant Shiv wasn't able to get started on her simpler

But she did have some good news about her new simplified beginner's weaving

I've got my first wholesale order.

Despite her loom breaking, Shiv took some big strides forwards with her

business. And when she reported back to us at the boot camp, she had marvellous

news.

How's sales looking so far? I have made 3 ,100 and...

£65. Over £3 ,000?

Yeah. And your loom broke?

Yeah. So that's amazing. You must be over the moon. Yeah, I'm really, really

happy, yeah.

Shiv had to take off her costs, but she had proven she had what it took to build

a successful business.

18 months later, I've come to her studio in Brighton to see how she's got on

since and how much money she's making now.

Hiya, come in!

Hello, you okay?

Yeah, good, thank you. How are you doing? Yeah, very good, thank you.

Look at this place.

Shiv's studio looks fantastic, with her beautiful loom taking centre stage.

But I've come to find out about the success she's having with her business,

I want to get straight down to brass tacks.

I cannot believe it's been over 18 months since you were last at the boot

How have you been in that time? What's new?

Big news is that I'm pregnant.

congratulations thank you and um for a renovation which we are deep in the

middle of as well as trying to run a small business so lots of going on lots

things are going maybe on the way yeah new house which is a renovation project

yes and a thriving business how is the business going the weaving kits are

selling really really well they just kind of fly off the shelves now wow i do

recognize some things up here these cushions in particular yeah they've been

selling really well blankets haven't got any of those to show you because i

actually sold two last week and i've been able to get my designs into

which is really good and i've also been voted the top artisan Top 40

artisans from country living.

Really? Yeah, top eight, which means I get a mentorship with Emma Bridgewater.

Oh, my goodness. So, yeah, there's a lot going on and a lot of exciting things

going on. That's amazing.

Features in magazines, a mentorship with a renowned British creative

entrepreneur and products flying off the shelves.

Shiv is smashing it.

Her cushions are now priced between £68 and £125, but her bestseller is her

weaving kit.

Since the bootcamp, she's sold 750 of them and has raised the price from £28

£29 .50.

She's also currently developing a more advanced one with a range of patterns

£36, and I'm going to try it out.

What a beginner's kit.

I wanted to make a new kit, so this is kind of me. I am testing this kit out on

you. I'm the guinea pig. You are the guinea pig. Bring it on.

So I've got like a sea -themed pattern that I've been working on. It's really

fun. We're going to do the lobster, Larry the lobster.

Larry. Using a mini frame loom, job one is to create the blue background of the

piece by wrapping it around the teeth on either side of the loom, then tying it

off. Under and around, I'm going to try and not round it. Around, through there.

Yep.

With the background in place, I start weaving the pattern, beginning with the

blue C.

You're going to go back on yourself, over two, under two. And then the same

the way. All the way to the other end, yeah.

It's very repetitive.

You can see how much you have to concentrate and kind of switch off from

world around you. I'm curious to know, something that Paige wanted you to look

into was using QR codes.

Yeah, I did think really, really hard about that. Yeah, I can't see any. No,

And I decided that the whole point of the kit is meant to kind of make you

switch off from the world around you, put your phone down and get absorbed

completely into the craft.

So having a QR code... Which you'd have to get your phone out to scan.

Exactly. It's a great idea for, you know, saving money. But at the moment,

you know, I'm unable to order more.

because I'm selling more kits.

So that cost has gone down quite a lot because now I'm ordering more. You can

order in bulk. I love that you've sold it in a completely different way by

so successful.

You're now selling enough that you can just order them in bulk.

With the first part of the sea woven, it's time to move on to creating Larry.

We're just going to... And then over there.

And that's your first line of Larry the Lobster. Larry's tail has started.

This is good.

So if you turn the needle on its side like that, it'll be easier. Okay.

I mean, it's been a year and a half now since you were at the boot camp, and

you've done so well.

You can see that the direction you're going in is just brilliant.

Yeah, it is, and the fact that I can kind of just do the craft that I love

make it into a full -time job is, yeah, it's the dream that's coming true. It's

coming true, yeah. So, yeah, it's great. Things are looking good. Yes, they

really are.

Oh, no, I was talking about my lobster.

Bad jokes aside, Shiv is making fantastic progress with her business,

been working with a big international brand, too.

In the summer, I did a little collaboration with IKEA.

They just opened up a... Oh, just a little collaboration.

They opened up a new store in the local shopping centre and they got in contact

with local artisans and craftspeople and we all got to design a little room that

was inspired by what we love.

And then they came and made a video about my studio and, yeah, so it was a

of, like, self -promotion.

With Larry the Lobster progressing well...

It's time to bring in our third colour for his eyes.

Here is the black.

OK, third colour, so then it's, what, it's just over, just looping over.

He's got googly eyes. He's got his eyes.

He just needs a couple of hands and he's finished.

A very good attempt with your first lobster.

I've really enjoyed weaving Larry.

He takes around three hours to complete.

and is one of five patterns in Shiv's new advanced seaside themed kit which

she's priced at £36.

It will help her to build on the success of her beginners kit which she's

simplified as we suggested by reducing the number of yarns from 14 to 10 and

keen to know if any of the other advice we gave her has helped to drive her

success.

18 months has absolutely flown by since you were last at my boot camp.

And we did send you away with an action plan. One of the key pointers that we

wanted you to look into was the velvet on the back of your cushions. But I can

still see a lot of it here. Yeah. I did trial it on the website. I used to give

people the option for about last year.

To have woven on both sides. Or they could choose the velvet, contrasting

colours. So it kind of makes my fabrics pop a little bit, I think.

You prefer it. Yeah.

It's fine.

Yeah. Something else at Puge wanted you to try and work on a more cohesive

collection, which was more simple. Mm -hmm. Nothing sort of stripped back and

not quite as many bright and vivid colours.

I'm assuming this is it. Yeah, so these are a little bit more tame and kind

of... They look great.

Thank you. So some of these aren't online yet, but some of them are, and

have been selling really well.

These have been selling really, really well, just kind of like plain kind of...

twills and stuff and then they kind of go matching with the blankets it sounds

like that was sound advice yeah it's great to hear that shiv has tried out

part of her action plan and that most of it has been helpful in building her

business but it's time to ask the all -important question do you mind if we

figures i know i know it's awkward i know it's all good but i want this to

for you it sounds like it really is yeah i mean what's the business making at

the moment About £23 ,000 a year. A year? A year.

How does that feel?

It feels great. It feels great. It's really opened up, locked the doors.

It's a big number. It's a lot of money. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And it's a living that

I can actually live off compared to what it was before where I was just kind of

just getting by.

This all sounds very, very positive.

And I can't wait to see what you do next.

Thank you. Yeah, I'm really excited to see what's going to happen in the next,

like... Two years, five years, ten years. I can't wait.

Making £23 ,000 a year so soon after leaving my boot camp is an incredible

achievement. Even more so as Shiv is still working three days a week as a

textiles technical instructor.

Her future looks very exciting indeed.

I've really surprised myself in the last 18 months with how much I've achieved.

I think probably the biggest achievement is actually...

Being able to say that I'm making enough money that I've been able to put a

deposit down on a house, and my business has kind of helped me do that, and

that's a really big achievement.

The second talented maker we'll be catching up with today is artist Jill

Berkshire, who came to my business building boot camp.

having taken the very big decision to leave her nursing job to try and build a

new creative career.

When I was growing up, we didn't have any money.

Art for me was a massive thing, and I was told to get a proper job.

I don't regret my life because I wouldn't have my kids, I wouldn't have

I wouldn't have done nursing.

But I stopped hoping it would happen, and now here I am. This is a dream come

true.

Like Shiv, I gave Jill three challenges, starting with making a volume piece.

She decided to paint a portrait of her pet chicken, Ruby, using acrylic paints

and pens on a 40cm pre -painted canvas priced at £100.

She started by sketching out Ruby with a pastel pencil using a photograph for

reference. I'm just making very light marks. I don't want to commit myself to

anything just yet.

Trying to get the angle of the eyes as well. You wouldn't want to have them

straight on because they wouldn't be right because the head is tilted.

Once I've got the angle of the eyes in, I then know how much to tilt her head as

well.

As Jill tried to fulfil her dream of earning a living from her art, she was

guided by professional artist Sharon Walters.

Known internationally for her incredible hand -assembled collages, Sharon has

also worked with Sotheby's Institute of Art, The Tate, and the National Portrait

Gallery.

Now, chickens aren't everyone's cup of tea, so Sharon wanted to talk to Jill

about who she was going to sell her picture to.

I'm not really clear on this market. Who buys your work?

Chicken people.

I do the work because I'm a crazy chicken person, and then people who love

chickens buy it. I live in the country, so there is a market for it there.

There may have been customers for Jill's chickens in the countryside.

But she wasn't keen about travelling to markets and fairs to find them.

I struggle going anywhere, really, with my work. Sometimes I'll do something and

I sort of hand it over to people and I'm just kind of like, don't have it, don't

look at it, please.

It's yours, but just don't look at it too closely.

But I think that's a confidence thing. I want to have that level of confidence

that I could just, yeah, I'll just go to that market.

But I think that takes time. That takes time and try not to be too hard on

yourself. But I think going to markets with your work would definitely help you

with that.

Whilst Jill cracked on with her volume piece, I wanted to take a look at the

item she created for her second challenge.

Before she arrived at the boot camp, I asked her to bring along a high -end

piece, something she could charge more for, and she decided to showcase a

commissioned family portrait triptych.

In addition to taking hundreds of photographs and sketching and painting

piece, it included around 12 hours of consultation time and took several weeks

to create.

It was priced at £1 ,500, but would Sharon think it was something she could

build a business on?

I really like it. I loved how they were sectioned off into different pieces,

which I think is a really nice way of presenting a portrait.

It's quite creative. Yeah, it is. It's really creative.

Are there any sort of pointers you think that actually that area could be

improved? I think she could try to work on her technique a little bit more,

experiment more.

She needs something unique about the work.

More personal to her. More personal, yes.

Jill's asking price is £1 ,500 for that painting.

It's a lot of money, but it's still a fair price for what she's doing. My only

concern is that with her consultation time of going back and forth and taking

photographs, time is money. She has to remember that this is a business, so she

can do that, but in far less time.

Back in the artist's studio, Jill had finished sketching out her pet portrait

her chicken Ruby and was preparing to paint.

I'm going to start off with this lovely red because I think I'm going to have to

layer that up quite a bit in order to get it to really show.

I instinctively mix my colours, but that doesn't mean I get it right every

time. The joy of working in acrylics is that you can go over it again.

The more accurate I get, the happier I am to sell it. I've got such guilt for

charging people for my work.

It's something I need to...

Get over.

Do you know what? Actually, no, don't pay me anything.

I have to stop myself from saying that to people.

With the main design done, Jill moved on to the finer details of the portrait.

I'm trying to pick out some places to highlight, thinking about where the

is coming from.

I'm not trying to do it perfectly. I really like the freedom and the movement

that you get with just sort of quite loose and fluid brush strokes.

Once the brushwork was finished...

She used acrylic paint pens to work on the finer details.

I like the mark -making, I like the lines. It picks out little bits of

highlights and hair or feathers.

Also, I really like the movement it creates.

Animals are not static, so I don't ever want to give the impression that they're

not moving around.

Jill's pet portrait of Ruby the chicken took her just over three hours to create

and had material costs of £10.

It was full of detail and real character and came with a price tag of £100.

I think it's great. I think the scale is brilliant, the artwork itself, and you

can see the enjoyment through the brush strokes.

Thank you. What are your thoughts on the £100 price tag? I think the price tag

is good. I mean, you can review your prices as you continue.

Are there any pointers you can give Jill?

go -to exhibitions, other artists that are creating in similar ways but with a

completely different style.

I'm not telling you to copy those artists at all.

But what I am telling you to do is just look at the techniques that they use.

That will really help to push your work forward.

Jill's first two pieces wowed Sharon and I. And for her third challenge, we

asked her to produce her favourite piece to see if what she loved working on the

most could help her to build her business.

She chose to paint a character portrait of me because portraits are something

she wanted to make a bigger part of her business.

Using a photo taken at a friend's wedding, she worked with acrylic paints

pens on a 55 by 55 centimetre handmade canvas.

I've come to really love portraiture.

It's about capturing the character of that person, trying to get that little

twinkle in their eye.

Dom is really funny, really warm, and he's exactly the type of person you

probably imagine yourself sitting in at the pub having a pint.

The first thing I need to do is block off my areas of dark and light.

Definitely light. I need to block those areas off because they take maybe three

or four layers to actually cover the canvas.

Blocking out the light and shade, bringing in the base colours and working

the dimensions of my features took Jill around an hour before she could start on

the top layers and details.

But I could resist no more.

Jill, can I have a look? Yeah, you can have a look.

You sure? Yeah, it always looks terrible by the way at the beginning.

Oh my!

It's looking slightly terrifying at the moment, I'm not going to lie. Yeah, a

little bit creepy. It's all a bit rough and ragged at the minute, but then I'll

tighten everything up towards the end. It's going to come together. You're so

clever. I love it. Well, I think three Doms is too much for anybody, so I'll

leave you to it.

After adding a second layer of paint to her character portrait... What I need to

focus on now is getting those details in the right place.

The eyes, teeth, making sure they're correct.

Mentor Sharon wanted to find out more about how Jill was promoting herself and

her art.

I've had a look through your social media.

How do you feel about what you post and how you share your work? I don't want to

annoy people.

I always feel a bit like, all right, OK, I'll post and then I'll wait a couple

of days and I might post again. And then I forget to post completely and I don't

do anything for about a month. I think it's important to be consistent but also

intentional about what you're posting. We can work on that together.

After adding the final finishing touches to her piece, Jill mounted the canvas

in a handmade frame.

The portrait took her around eight and a half hours to create and came with a

sales price of £350.

Jill. Why on earth have you chosen to paint this for your favourite piece? I

really, really enjoyed doing it. Did you? Yeah, I did. I feel sorry for you,

having to stare at a picture of me.

What do you think, Sharon? I think it's a brilliant piece of work. She's really

captured your joy and your personality.

What do you think about the £350 price tag? Obviously nowhere near enough. I

genuinely don't think it is enough. Oh, really? It's years and years of

practice, and it's your skills that people are paying for. OK. You could

probably add another £100 to that.

Giving up nursing to follow her dream of becoming an artist was a risk, but Jill

impressed us in all of the challenges we gave her, and as she headed back to

Berkshire, we gave her an action plan to help turn her talent into a thriving

art practice.

First, she needed to go to galleries and exhibitions to study other artists'

work, to help her find her own distinctive style.

Next, we wanted Jill to reduce the time she spent on consultations for

commissions.

to free up time to produce other pieces.

Finally, she needed to work on promoting and selling her pieces online and in

person at the right craft fairs and markets.

For the next two months, Sharon supported Jill as she worked her socks

get her business off the ground, starting with trying to reduce the time

spent on consultations for her commissions.

I thought maybe we could use the kitchen table and have it represented by our

favourite glasses with our favourite drink.

So what I'll do is I will get you to take some photographs.

Today would probably be a good day because it's so sunny.

She also began building up her catalogue of work to promote on her social media.

I started painting this lady.

She's a musician.

She's enjoying the moment.

We were also keen for Jill to get out and start selling her work, and she

a country fair with the right target market for her animal art.

I've had loads of engagement with people.

I mean, you've got a real variety of subjects.

Potential commissions coming through.

I've nearly run out of business cards. This is exactly what I want to be doing

and exactly where I want to be.

In the eight weeks after my boot camp, Jill followed every word of our advice.

And when she reported back, she had made phenomenal progress.

How much have you made?

In the last eight weeks, I've made £4 ,120.

Really? I can't believe it, like, genuinely.

It's been great. You've worked really hard. You've been really open and

to learn.

That's why the last eight weeks have been a success and why you will continue

be a success.

I hope so.

There was no need to hope.

Jill had to take off her coughs from her fantastic sales figure, but she'd

proven she could make her gamble to give up her nursing career pay off.

Two and a half years later, I've asked Sharon to pop along to Berkshire to

her and find out how she's built on that early success and how much money her

art is bringing in now.

Hi, Jill.

Hi. How are you? Good morning.

So good to see you.

You too. How are you?

I'm good.

Jill creates her pieces from this fabulous purpose -built studio in her

It's a brilliant place to work, and I'm keen to know more about the success

she's had here, surrounded by nature and her chickens.

So how have things been going since boot camp?

Amazing. Really?

Yeah, since I took your advice, I've gone from doing one to two commissions a

month to...

three to four a week sometimes.

I think I've done about 200 commissions in the last three years.

I've been doing workshops, lots of community engagement.

Great news. Are you managing to sell any of your own work?

I think this has been the biggest surprise for me, actually. I've sold

lot. I've been really busy.

I've had a few exhibitions, solo shows that I've done, not really expecting to

get very much, but selling quite a lot from that, and then generating income

from the website as well.

What are your best sellers?

Commissions are my best sellers. I do a lot of seascapes and figurative people

in seascapes and things like that. They can go from anything between £350 ,000

to £1 ,500 ,000. It really depends on the size.

I still do a lot of animals, which is great because those are my fun days. I

go in and I can just spend some time painting dogs and looking at pictures of

animals, which I do absolutely love. It sounds as though things are going really

well. It is.

I never thought I'd get to this point. I have allowed my nursing registration to

lapse. I actually could have kept it going, but I decided that, no, now was

time. If I didn't do it now, I wasn't going to do it. So I'm no longer

Letting her nursing registration lapse is a massive move for Jill.

It means she can't now go back to the career she loved, but it's a great sign

how well things are going.

To show Sharon one of the key pieces that's driving her business forwards.

She's going to create one of her best -selling seascapes, priced at £375.

She starts by preparing the canvas with a pop of pink paint around the edge,

leaves it to dry, then adds masking tape to protect the colour, and creates a

line across the middle where the sky will meet the horizon.

So I'll start off in acrylic and then I can finish up in oils.

Start from the top and work my way down, and I love how it all just starts to

come.

I love this bit. I love it so much. Sometimes I do two at once.

Yeah. If I had a third hand, I'd do more. Yeah.

But it's so therapeutic.

As the paint for the sky needs to dry, Jill's pre -prepared a second canvas.

And after taking off the tape, she moves it to an easel with the sky at the top

and adds more tape to create a new horizontal line, below which she's going

paint the sea and beach.

I'm just going to start with my initial

colours for the sea and what I think I can see.

I'm just going to work out roughly where the shoreline is now. I've got some

waves.

I would just start building up some of the darker colours here.

Speed is key here. You just want to go as fast as possible and not really think

about it. I think my favourite paintings are certainly the ones that I've done

or the ones that are the most expressive without being overworked and

overthought about.

I love adding in colours into the beach.

Sand, you think of yellow or white or brown or whatever, but for me it's

and orange and peach.

silver and all these things it's just lovely to be able to put some of that in

with the seascape blocked out the paint needs to dry so jill moves on to

sketching out the figures on the beach on another pre -prepared canvas and

begins filling them in i'm just going to start with the darker areas of the coat

i tend to go dark to from dark to light

This is looking good. So this is a commission, isn't it?

Yeah, yeah. So this is a really simple seascape. I've done quite a few of

It's quite nice. A lot of people might want a portrait of themselves, but they

don't want one, you know, face on or anything.

Constantly mixing.

Lovely seeing your work come together.

With the acrylic painting finished, Jill gathers a palette of oil paints to

highlight key parts of the piece.

What's the biggest lesson you've learned since boot camp?

It's to do with balancing time and working out how to manage

finances in a way that doesn't leave me.

destitute you know when I go through periods of time when I'm not earning

it's being able to plan ahead and that's been a really big challenge because

I've got really excited when I've sold a big painting and not really thought

about the next few months where I might not be earning quite so much money I'm

just about finished now all I need to do is add the final highlights and this is

just a really nice simple piece of work

I want to keep it simple, not overcomplicate.

Jill's 40 by 40 centimetre seascape takes her up to five hours to produce,

material costs of £20 and a price tag of £375.

It's been a treat watching her work again and having seen her promote her

online and at fairs, I want to know what role the rest of the advice we gave her

two and a half years ago has played in her success and how much she's earning

from her art now.

When you were at boot camp, I remember we gave you an action plan and there

some tips and tricks.

One of the things we asked you to do was to actually go and visit some galleries

and some exhibitions, help you find your own voice, your own distinctive style.

How has that gone for you?

It's actually become just such a massive part of my life now. It's not just

something that I do as a hobby. I'm really involved in it. I'm really

in the art community and I absolutely love going out to galleries and seeing

work. So if there's anything on, I'll be there and pop along. It's just so

interesting to see other people and make friends as well. So it's a really big

part of what I do now. One of the things we also wanted you to do was to reduce

your consultation time.

so that you had more time to create new work.

How are you getting on with that?

Yeah, much better.

I think that's something that comes with experience.

I think knowing exactly what you want from a painting is maybe not necessarily

something you learn straight away.

So for me, I can go to a client and I can find out what it is that they want

I know how to achieve that, so I know what to ask for and I know what kind of

photographs or settings that I want to produce.

So it works really well.

It's fantastic seeing the huge progress Jill has made since we first met her two

and a half years ago.

And it's time to find out how the books are looking now.

When you came to boot camp, one of the things that we were working on was to

and get you to the point where you'd be making a living from your art practice.

How's that happened for you?

Oh, yes, absolutely making a living from it.

I think quite quickly I was earning as much.

as I had been previously with my paid job working as a nurse.

Last year, I look back and I'd earned £32 ,000.

Fantastic. So, yeah, much more than I expected, but that's just from working,

working, working.

Yeah. Yeah, keep going. The quality of life now.

Being able to be there and support my family and get my kids to school and

work and still be a professional and still feel valid every single day is

-changing. I get to be here.

It's wonderful. It's such a privilege.

Moving on from her nursing career was a huge step for Jill. But with an income

of £32 ,000 after costs, it's one that's put her on the path to a new,

successful, creative life.

The last two and a half years has been just the most epic adventure and quite a

whirlwind. I've learned so much. I've grown so much. I never expected to be

changing careers at nearly 40. But also now, I feel like I'm a professional and

I know what I'm doing a little bit more than what I did before.

So I'm really proud of what I've achieved.

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