Five Years in Devon — Built From the Ground Up

Folk Interior began in our garage.

Stock crept into every corner of the house. Larger furniture moved into a barn shared with my husband’s wine and a collection of broken chairs from his bars. We made space where there wasn’t any. Daily trips to the Post Office were the norm.

Then came 2020 — when Sir Patrick Stewart mentioned his love of jigsaw puzzles on The Graham Norton Show. By chance, we stocked that exact puzzle.

We sold 150 overnight.

That moment didn’t build the business — but it changed its pace. We finally got a Royal Mail Collection!

By Christmas 2021, growth outpaced our reality. We packed 5,500 parcels from a borrowed social club in Stockport — no running water, one socket, snow suits indoors, supermarket trips just to keep going.

And in the middle of that chaos, we learned how to use Google Ads to grow our eCommerce business — and started investing. For the first time, growth became something we could influence, not just react to.

Moving south was always part of the plan.

We found the warehouse online. Too far away to visit, a new friend in Devon went to see it for us — walking through with her phone, sending videos, helping us decide from a distance.

We said yes.

Quoted £20,000 to move everything — we hired a van instead.

My husband drove the entire business down in two loads, then went back the following week to move our home.

My mum friends came with me to keep orders going while we transitioned, hired, and built new systems. And when we arrived, new Devon friends showed up to help unload.

It was never just us — it was people stepping in at the right moments.

The warehouse has been perfect in all the ways that matter.

Double-skinned, so dry. Huge, so full of possibility.

But still a warehouse.

Cold in winter. Practical. Unpolished.

We built all the shelving ourselves. Created a packing room within it just to try and hold some warmth through the colder months.

It works. And it’s ours — or at least, it’s rented for now.

And like everything else in this journey, it’s a step. Not the final destination.

It works and Linzie heads off to hotter climate for 6 weeks every February to warm her bones.

Over the past three years, as the business has grown, so has the pace.

Linzie, Vicky and I have picked orders every morning in that warehouse — day in, day out.

Between the three of us, we see everything.
Vicky speaking to customers, stockists, trade customers, organising the website and stocking the shops. She is my right hand at the moment.

Linzie overseeing the packing room; her eagle eye doesn't miss a thing.

Me across stock, ordering, packing orders, speaking to customers and everything else that comes with running a business.

We know where everything is.
How many we have.
What’s coming in.
What needs reordering.

As a small UK business, scaling hasn’t been linear… Since moving to Devon, we’ve processed over 62,000 orders.

And somewhere along the way, I realised something important:

I’ve become the bottleneck.

My husband has always joked that I’m a glorified packer — and honestly, I’ve loved it. There’s something grounding about packing orders, about being that close to every customer.

But the reality is — I can’t do it all.

And the business has reached a point where it shouldn’t rely on one person knowing everything.

So now, things are changing again.

We’re investing in new warehouse software — introducing barcoding across all of our stock.

It means fewer errors, better visibility, and the ability to properly train a team.

We’ve also invested in a new website this year — and that has brought its own challenges.

More orders has meant more emails — far more than we expected.

We now have two people managing customer enquiries in different locations, and as we’ve grown, we’ve hit a few bumps — bounced emails, misplaced threads, and even an automated message that accidentally filtered emails into the wrong place.

We’re working through it.

Vicky has always prided herself on thoughtful, timely replies, and that remains incredibly important to us — so thank you for your patience while we get this right.

And this is where things begin to shift.

Chloe has stepped in — replying to messages, laying out orders, and helping manage the new warehouse systems as they come into place.

For the first time, it feels like the knowledge and responsibility are starting to spread.

Linzie, who has been such a constant in the warehouse, heads off each February and March for a month in the sunshine (a well-earned tradition we fully support). And this year, for the first time, the warehouse keeps moving without missing a beat.

Because we’ve also welcomed Isy — our newest team member — who is now packing orders and becoming part of the rhythm of the space.

It’s a shift from “just us” to something more.

Even as things change, one thing hasn’t.

Every single order is still packed with care.

Each box is thoughtfully wrapped, sprinkled with a little bit of magic before it leaves us. That part has always mattered — and always will.

We also reuse and recycle as much packaging as possible. Many of the boxes we send out have already had a life before reaching you — something we’re proud of as we try to grow responsibly.

To 74,633 orders later…

We’re still learning what it means to scale a small, independent interiors business in a sustainable way.

But now, we’re learning how to let go — just enough — to let it grow.

And in many ways, that feels like the most important step yet.

If the last five years have been about building — the next phase is about strengthening.

Better systems.

A growing team.

A business that doesn’t rely on one person holding everything together.

And perhaps, one day, a space that’s truly our own.

From garage floors…

To barns…

To freezing Christmas packing…

To driving our own stock across the country…

To a rented warehouse in Devon…

To 74,888 orders later…

We’re still learning.

And as always — we don’t quite know what’s next.

But that’s how it’s always been.