The sixteen house paintings

Most of this site assumes you have a photograph of a particular house. Sometimes you don't. The house is rented and you can't ask for a photo without ruining the surprise, or the person is moving somewhere they haven't chosen yet, or the thing being marked is the idea of the home rather than one address. That's what these are for.

They're paintings of houses that don't belong to anybody, sold as they are. Nothing is uploaded and nothing is restyled: you pick the picture, choose a format, and it's printed to order like everything else here. What follows is all sixteen, grouped by the sort of house each one is, so you can find the near-match rather than scrolling a grid.

Cottages and gardens

The soft-edged ones, mostly watercolour, and the group that suits a country move or a house somebody has fallen in love with rather than merely bought.

• Cottage Garden, a cottage half-swallowed by a summer garden of hollyhocks and roses, in loose romantic watercolour. The one to reach for when the garden was the reason they bought it.
• Thatched Cottage, a storybook cottage with wisteria over the door, in soft golden watercolour.
• Seaside Cottage, a whitewashed cottage with a blue door above a shingle beach, painted as a vintage travel poster in azure and sand. The obvious choice for a move to the coast.
• The Garden Gate, a weathered gate standing ajar onto a path that winds to a cottage door, in gentle nostalgic watercolour. It belongs with the cottages because of what's at the end of the path.

Streets, terraces and townhouses

The urban half of the collection, and the group with the strongest architecture in it. These suit a first flat, a terrace, or anybody whose house is one of a row.

• Terrace in Spring, a row of pastel terraced houses under cherry blossom, as a mid-century travel poster in blossom pink, mint and sky.
• Autumn Street, a leafy residential street in full autumn colour, in rich atmospheric watercolour of amber and grey-blue. The same subject as the terrace, six months later.
• Townhouse Evening, an elegant Georgian townhouse at dusk with the windows glowing warm, in refined oil of indigo, amber and stone.
• Victorian Villa, a handsome red-brick villa with bay windows and a tiled path, as a crisp architectural illustration. The nearest thing here to a great many British houses.
• Mews House, a pretty cobbled mews with a painted house and hanging baskets, in charming architectural illustration.

The threshold

Three paintings that stop at the front door rather than showing the whole building, which makes them the group that fits any house at all. If you don't know what the place looks like, start here.

• The Blue Front Door, a classic panelled door in soft duck-egg blue with a brass knocker and geraniums on the step, in delicate watercolour.
• The Welcome Mat, a doorstep still life of mat, wellingtons, watering can and a bay tree, in cosy oil of olive and terracotta.
• The New Keys, house keys on a ribbon on a sunlit sill, in tender ink and wash. It's the first day of a new home, and it's the one that works as a completion-day present when nobody has seen the house yet.

Inside, and after dark

The interiors, plus the one exterior that's really about the light coming out of it. This group is about the house being lived in rather than acquired, so it suits a move that happened a while ago.

• The Hallway, a cosy entrance hall with coats on pegs, a bowl for keys and patterned tiles, in inviting oil of ochre and teal.
• The Bay Window, a curved bay with a dozing cat on the sill, as a clean mid-century graphic in teal and mustard.
• The Reading Nook, a worn armchair, a lamp and a stack of books by a window, in warm painterly oil.
• Home at Dusk, a family house at dusk with every window glowing gold against a violet sky, in tender oil. It's outside looking in, which is why it sits with the interiors rather than with the streets.

How to choose one

Two routes. If you know the house, find the near-match: a red-brick villa, a pastel terrace, a cottage behind a gate. Nobody expects a painting bought off a shelf to be their actual address, and the resemblance is the pleasure of it. If you don't know the house, take one of the threshold three, because a front door, a doormat and a set of keys belong to every house there is.

All sixteen print on the same formats as everything else here, so the size and frame decisions are the ones on on the wall. And if you do have a photograph after all, the illustration made from it will always be more specific than any of these.

This is the last page of on the wall and the end of the path. It starts again at the move.

Written by Craig Fearn, Our House Print.