Stuck at home bored, jobless, and looking for distraction at the start of the pandemic, Tabitha Osborne-Fox was flicking through Instagram when some paintings made with resin caught her eye.
While some of us learned to knit or made industrial quantities of banana bread during the long weeks of lockdown, Tabitha did some quick research, ordered supplies and then — with the aid of YouTube — decided to teach herself the technique to while away the time.
Four years on that creative whim has changed Tabitha’s life, freeing her from a fast-paced London career to launch a business that allows her to combine creativity with motherhood. It has also allowed her and her young family to return to her West Country roots.
“At the time it was just a way of coping with the pandemic, but when I put up some pictures of what I was doing on my Instagram people started to go nuts for it,” she said. “I started to think that it was at least something I could do as a side hustle.”
Before she moved to London in 2014 Tabitha, now 32, had never lived in a big city before.
She was raised on a farm on Exmoor, and studied at the University of Gloucestershire and so the move was a big culture shock. “I wanted the city life, and to get on the career ladder,” she said. “I was interested in sports marketing and events, and London was really the only place I could do that.”
Tabitha made the move with her university boyfriend, Patrick, also 32, and life went well for the young couple. Tabitha got an interesting starter job, travelled the world, and was then headhunted to help set up a digital consultancy. Patrick, meanwhile, built a career in sales, specialising in fabric for men’s formal wear.
“I wanted the city life, and to get on the career ladder.”
They got married in 2019 and bought a three-bedroom split-level flat in Brixton, renting a spare bedroom out to a friend to help make ends meet.
The pandemic threw a major spanner into the works. Tabitha’s main client had been a travel company, and work dried up. “We decided to close the digital consultancy,” she said. “I think that we were all keen to have a new journey. I really fell into the job, and it wasn’t really me.”
What Tabitha was really interested in was sport — she had grown up surfing, was the British women’s bodyboarding champion in 2010 and joined the England surf team the following year, before studies and work grounded her.
She was also becoming increasingly interested in resin art, setting up a studio space under the stairs and creating platters, coasters, and wall art, with designs inspired by her love of the sea. After a while she decided to set up a company, FoxSea Art, to sell her work.
Then, in 2021, Tabitha discovered she was pregnant.
Providentially, Patrick was then headhunted for a new job based in Somerset. The stars had aligned and the couple decided to relocate to Devon where they could be closer to Tabitha’s family, afford a larger home, and be able to spend more time outdoors.
By the end of that year, after a spell staying on the farm with the folks, they rented out their London flat. They use the income to rent a newly built four-bedroom detached house in Barnstaple, which costs circa £1,200 a month. Their first child, Millicent, is now almost three, and last year they had a second child, Frederick, who is just over a year old.
Tabitha still works from home, having commandeered the garage as a studio, with a workshop at her parent’s farm, and FoxSea art sells a range of jewellery, homewares, art, and, having taught herself carpentry, furniture.
Over the summer she sells at craft fairs and events, and also sells her pieces online.
“I enjoyed my time in London but for us, now, this is the right place to be.”
“I run the business around the children and it is lovely working for myself and having that fluidity,” she said. “When you go to shows and markets you instantly have colleagues — without the office politics. You are all in the same boat and you all champion each other so it is easy to make a community of artistic friends. And going for a surf counts as research.”
Tabitha has also found it easy to pick up new friends at children’s groups, reconnected with old friends from homes, and got to know her neighbours by setting up a local running club.
“I am a social person, and I love to be active,” she said. “I enjoyed my time in London but for us, now, this is the right place to be.”
