House portraits
A house portrait from a photograph
Your house in oil, from the angle it actually looks best from — and without the wheelie bins, the wires or the neighbour's extension.
Houses are the subject where accuracy matters most and where painters quietly cheat. A house portrait gets checked against the building itself: the number of panes in each sash, the band of brick above the door, whether the porch has two steps or three. Make it beautiful and put the windows in the wrong place, and you have a nice painting of somebody else's house. Owners count the bricks along the front wall, and we would rather count them at the mock-up stage than argue about them afterwards.
The good news is that a house does not move. You can photograph it on four days from six positions and take the best of each. Almost every house portrait we paint is a composite of two or three photographs: the façade from one, the light from another, the planting from a third, and the telephone wire from none. You do not need a good camera for this, only a still day and four positions: two corners of the front garden, and the same two taken from further back across the road.
The angle decides the painting
Straight on, a house looks like an estate agent's photograph — flat, symmetrical, dead. A corner view, standing at the garden wall so two façades are visible, gives the building depth, shows the return of the roof, and lets light describe one wall while the other stays back in shadow. That is why most house portraits that work are painted from a corner, even when the owner's favourite photograph is the front elevation.
The exception is a terrace, where a corner view just shows the neighbour's wall. There we use a slight turn and a low viewpoint so the roofline has some perspective, and let planting and shadow do the work. Two feet of extra garden in the foreground is often the difference between a painting and a survey drawing.
Light, season and the things you want gone
Mid-morning and late afternoon light both work; midday in June does not, because the sun is overhead and every bit of relief on the façade is flattened into its own shadow. Overcast is underrated — it holds the brickwork — but it is also the light that makes a painting look grey unless warmth is put back into the stone. Send what you have and we will say which parts of the light we keep and which we rebuild.
Then there is the list of removals, longer than people expect: telephone wires, satellite dishes, bins, a car on the drive, a For Sale board, the neighbour's extension, a dog. All of that can go, and the space is filled with what sits behind it — sky, hedge, wall. What we will not do is change the house itself: no extra bay, no wider drive, no invented wisteria.
Season is a separate decision. A house photographed in February can be painted in June with the birch in leaf, provided you send a second photograph of the garden in summer so the planting is observed rather than invented. Blossom in particular should come from a photograph: a painter guessing at a flowering cherry produces pink clouds. If one particular plant has to be in flower, send the plant as well as the house — we can move it a few feet in the composition, but we cannot invent its shape.
What size a house needs
A single façade with some garden works at 16 × 20 in, the size most people choose; below that the window bars start to disappear and the house loses its character. A corner view with two façades and a proper foreground wants 20 × 24 in. A house with a drive, mature trees and a family standing in front of it is a multi-subject painting and is priced as one.
If the house no longer exists, we work from whatever survives — a print, a slide, a photograph of a photograph. Those are restored digitally first for $60–$70 and you approve the restored version before painting starts, because a restoration is a proposal about what was probably there, and you are the one who knows.
What it costs
Price is set by canvas size and the number of subjects — not by the occasion, the deadline, or how much detail you ask for. The table below is the same one used on every painting page, so there is no quote to wait for.
| Canvas | Metric | 1 subject | 2 subjects | 3 subjects | 4+ subjects |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 8 × 10 in | 20 × 25 cm | $189 | $259 | — | — |
| 12 × 16 in | 30 × 41 cm | $289 | $379 | $459 | — |
| 16 × 20 in | 41 × 51 cm | $389 | $499 | $619 | $749 |
| 20 × 24 in | 51 × 61 cm | $549 | $699 | $849 | $1,029 |
| 24 × 36 in | 61 × 91 cm | $789 | $1,059 | $1,290 | $1,560 |
| 30 × 40 in | 76 × 102 cm | $1,090 | $1,449 | $1,749 | $2,090 |
| 36 × 48 in | 91 × 122 cm | $1,390 | $1,849 | $2,249 | $2,690 |
Shipping is free worldwide. Framing is optional and quoted separately — most customers have the canvas stretched by a local framer for $60–$120.
How it works
Send the photograph
One sharp phone photo is enough. Tell us the deadline, the wall it is going on, and anything that must or must not be in the picture.
See the mock-up within 24 hours
A digital composite at the exact canvas size and crop, so size and composition are settled before any paint is bought. Nothing is charged until you approve it.
Watch it being painted
Three to five weeks in real oil, with two progress photographs. You can raise a concern at either one — that is what they are for.
Approve, then it ships
You see the finished canvas first, with one free round of adjustments. Then it travels rolled in a rigid tube, tracked and insured, with the numbered certificate inside.
Real oil, not a print
Hand-painted on cotton canvas, varnished, signed. Brushwork you can see in raking light.
You approve before we paint
A digital mock-up at the exact size and crop, within 24 hours, included in the price.
Numbered certificate
Every painting ships with a signed COA stating artist, medium, size and year.
Free worldwide shipping
Rolled in a rigid tube, tracked and insured. No minimum, no distance surcharge.
Questions
Questions we actually get
$189 for 8 × 10 in, $289 for 12 × 16 in, $389 for the 16 × 20 in that most houses need, up to $1,390 at 36 × 48 in. Price depends on canvas size and how many subjects are in the picture, not on how much detail you ask for. Shipping is free worldwide, and framing is quoted separately if you want us to arrange it.
Yes, and we do it on most house commissions. Wires, dishes, bins, cars, signs and stray neighbours' extensions all come out, and the space is filled with whatever is behind them. You see the cleaned-up version in the mock-up before anything is painted, so nothing is removed without your agreement.
Yes, if you send a photograph of the garden in the season you want. The house can stay as photographed in winter while the trees are in leaf, but the planting has to come from a real reference — invented blossom looks like pink cotton wool at close range, and the owner always notices which tree is wrong.
Often yes. Old prints, slides and photographs of photographs can usually be restored enough to paint from, at $60–$70, and you approve the restoration first. If a whole wing was never photographed we will tell you rather than invent it, because an invented wing is the one thing the family will spot immediately.
Three to five weeks of painting plus three to five business days in transit, with a digital mock-up inside 24 hours and two progress photographs along the way. Rush delivery is three weeks including painting for $90, which is worth booking early in December if the painting is a Christmas present.
Send a photograph of the house
Four phone photos from different corners are enough for us to tell you the best angle, the right size and the date we can deliver.