Paints & Papers: How Little Greene Is Redefining Eco-Friendly British Heritage

British heritage brand Little Greene is championing a new environmental crusade using recycled and reformulated paint. Sophie Jones caught up with the company’s Creative Director, Ruth Mottershead, to find out more.

Tell us about your own personal journey at Little Greene

My father David Mottershead spent his early career working for a number of international paint and pigment companies and having gained a wider knowledge of the industry, he kindled a passion for the science of colour and founded the Little Greene Paint Company in 1996. My brother Ben and I grew up with the business, literally painting out colour cards round the kitchen table and visiting the factory in Snowdonia, where we still produce to this day. Ben and I joined the business well over a decade ago, and we have been working together as a family ever since. I grew up surrounded by colour and pattern which has always been a part of my life. My background is landscape architecture and urban design along with digital marketing, which has transitioned well into interior design.

I’m surrounded by a team of incredible people who share a passion for colour and the effect it can have on the atmosphere of a space. The name ‘Little Greene’ is in reference to a tiny 18th century hamlet outside of Manchester, which can be seen on ancient maps of the area, including the one on all our paint tins. With records dating back to the year 1773, the Little Greene Dye Works of Collyhurst Wood, on the outskirts of Manchester, is one of England's most ancient industrial sites for the making of paints and dye solutions. The fundamentals of formulating and making paints have not changed much since the era of The Little Greene Dye Works. Our process is still undertaken by the hands of time-served craftspeople rather than automated machines, right down to our sample pots, which are filled by hand from a glass jug.

How would you describe Little Greene’s design philosophy?

We have always believed it’s possible to create beautiful high-quality paints and wallpapers with minimal impact on the environment. There is green thinking at all operational levels, including a continual waste reduction programme, increased recycling, and ongoing work to minimise the impact of emissions and transportation. We have also planted a lovely wildflower meadow, which is already being colonised by wildlife in the area surrounding our office. We are firm believers that making small changes, be that to packaging, product or your local environment, can have a huge impact. Although there’s always more to do, as an independent, family business, we have the flexibility to make decisions based on what’s right for the environment, and not just what’s good for business. We are committed to socially and environmentally responsible production and our environmentally friendly paints and wallpapers are amongst the highest quality available. We insist on using the finest natural, organic and safe synthetic pigments, giving superb depth of colour, high covering power and the long life expected from modern paints. Our collections include interior and exterior finishes, floor paints and a signature range of hard-wearing, water-based ‘Intelligent Paints’, especially designed for today’s busy homes. Our paints and wallpapers represent over 300 years of decorative history. Referencing the key periods of interior design, from the 17th century to the late 20th century, we’re committed to an ongoing research programme, and are proud to breathe new life into the best colours and patterns from the past.

How does the brand communicate colours and pattern?

We love to share our expertise and inspire our customers to create design schemes. We like to present colours in an inspiring but usable way, designing tools such as colour cards with ‘flying colour chips’ designed to make scheming with fabrics easy. We provide ideas for all our wallpapers to help customers combine pattern and colour, and create professional tools such as fan decks, as well as inspirational showroom displays. Our Colour Consultancy services can be accessed at home, online or in showrooms, offering a wealth of expertise and advice. We design collections with the customer experience of colour at its heart. Our Colour Scales collection which offers tonal colours, made in families of four using varying strengths of the same pigment for each, is an easy way for customers to scheme, creating an interior with subtle nuances between rooms or on different areas of a room such as walls and woodwork.

Tell us something about the Little Greene design studio

It’s a crucial part of our business that’s always a hub of creativity and colour. I love working on the colour trends, the concepts for the collections and the ideas behind them. Choosing colours is a highly creative and deeply inspiring process. I‘m always looking at how we all live with colour and pattern, and how we can assist people in choosing colour and pattern for their homes. I work alongside some incredible people including our specialist colour maker Simon Hutchinson, who visits National Trust properties to find old colours for restoration projects and new collections, working with our archive and creating new colours which we play with and tweak until our ideas are realised. Working closely with the National Trust provides us with a unique opportunity to delve into a prestigious and eclectic mix of decorative styles and important archive materials. In return, we are delighted to have the opportunity to contribute to the vital work that they undertake. As proud custodians of historic decoration, Little Greene undertake an ongoing programme of research in which we discover, reformulate, and publish original paint colours and bygone recipes. In doing so, we are also committed to the care and conservation of the properties in which they were originally used. It’s wonderful to launch collections based on historical designs, rescaling, recolouring or simply reviving, and presenting them to a whole new audience, giving these historic treasures a place in contemporary interiors.

What’s next for Little Greene?

We always have multiple projects underway, which is fantastic, every day is different. We are continually looking for new ways to help customers choose and use colour and wallpaper. Our next focus is on inspiring people to use colour on their exteriors as well as their interiors, extending their colour palette outside. We are also working on further ecological and sustainability projects, we’ve always been totally committed to the ongoing well-being and protection of the world environment, we are firm believers that making small changes, be that to packaging, product or the local environment can have a big impact.

There’s always more to do, and we will continue to assess and review our methods, materials, and ways of working to further reduce our environmental impact. And of course, we are always looking at new colours to add to our collections too.

What could you not live without?

I’m surrounded by countryside and couldn’t imagine not having the wonders of nature on my doorstep. There’s so much inspiration to be found in the natural world, from patterns to colour palettes, it never ceases to amaze me. Many of our colour palettes and collections are rooted in nature, from ’Stone’ a collection of natural colours offering warmth, tranquillity, timelessness and harmony, inspired by the indefinably beautiful colours of stone, so pleasing to the eye and soothing for the soul, to our ‘Forest’ a curated collection of paints and wallpapers that reflect the natural world and enable us to bring it into our homes.

For you, what makes a house a home?

It’s family, anywhere can be home, if it’s where the ones you love are. I’m lucky enough to work in my family business, the benefits of that, are that I’m surrounded by the people I love, doing a job I love and if I need to travel, my family can travel with me.

Click here to learn more about Little Greene.