Before taking up her potter’s paintbrush, Sarah worked exclusively with textiles. She gained her first degree, BA (Hons) in Surface Pattern at SCAT in Somerset in 1996 and an MA in textiles from Bath University in 2008. She began developing her well-known range of cushions and wall hangings, inspired by a 2 day train journey from LA to Seattle. As the trees, barns and houses flashed past the windows she sketched them and used the quickly noted shapes to develop a new range of folk-art inspired designs of pillows, herb houses and doorstops. During this time she met her partner, potter Peter O’Neil. As she watched him working in his studio one day she asked if she could have a go at painting a pot or two, and the rest is history! Their relationship flourished and so did their creativity. Shortly afterwards, Earls Croome Pottery was born.

Peter has been throwing pots for over 30 years. He opened his first pottery in Cornwall in the early 1990s and since then he had run successful galleries in Marazion and Bath, selling beautiful British pottery and paintings. He has recently opened a beautiful gallery space at NT Croome where you can browse and buy all of the pieces that we have for sale on this website (plus a few larger items that we can't send through the post!) Peter has made and sold many pieces over the last three decades and you can often find them coming around for a second time at auction. After meeting and working with Sarah, Peter does not produce so much of his own work these days and is primarily focused on creating pots for Sarah to paint, along with his own experimental creations, so finding work for sale with his name on has become less common.