North Yorkshire designer Georgia Wilkinson takes inspiration for her quirky designs from the wildlife around her.

WORKING out of an old cricket pavilion, with her dog Tilly at her feet, her family close at hand and surrounded by open farmland, Georgia Wilkinson’s set-up is near perfect.

It was the lure of the North Yorkshire countryside that drew her back to the area after several years learning her trade in London.

And she hasn’t looked back.

Her design business is going from strength to strength; built on a collection of colourful fabrics featuring graphic images of wildlife including magpies, cockerels, owls, cattle, pigs and hares.

There is a floral range too with poppies, peonies and pansies as well as a pared down monochrome set of images of British birds, including the red kite, pheasant, partridge, bittern and mallard.

Georgia, aged 32, sells her work as printed fabrics, or as ready-made furnishings, with bestsellers being her cushions and lampshades.

At her studio on the family farm at Pilmoor, near Sessay, just off the A19 north of York, she also prints her own tea towels and has a special press allowing her to put her bird designs on to ceramic mugs.

New for this year are sets of tablemats and coasters all featuring her quirky style, with magpies, bees, lobsters, puffins, men in suits and champagne glasses.

“London was great for a few years, but I really missed the green spaces of North Yorkshire, and I really missed my dog. I wanted to be out in the open again,” says Georgia. Luckily, she was able to set up a studio in the perfect spot – a 1930s cricket pavilion, rescued by her family and brought to the farm.

Georgia has just added an extension so she now has more space to make her goods and run creative design workshops, including lampshade making.

Besides the wildlife of North Yorkshire, her other big inspiration comes from the late American artist Charley Harper.

“He was an American whose work was very stylised. It was used to illustrate biology textbooks,” says Georgia.

Much of Georgia’s work displays a similar flair for bold graphic design and colour.

“My fabrics are more of a statement piece, and not something you perhaps furnish your whole house in.

“Although I do have a lot of repeat customers who might buy a lampshade for one room and two cushions for another.”

Georgia has recently moved home to Ripon, but will continue working out of her studio at Pilmoor.

The site is a mini crafts community in its own right. Her mother Iris is a ceramic sculptor and runs courses from a nearby barn. Her brother James is an artisan blacksmith who also works from the farm and his wife Jess does basket weaving on site.

Georgia says: “It’s really nice having them all here. If I need a second opinion I can run things by them and they will be brutally honest.”

• Find out more at jorjawilkinsondesign.co.uk