Zoe Murphy Design

Zoe Murphy Design Furniture and textiles. Recycled, and printed by hand in Margate. Ever promoting the idea of 'Love what belongs to you'. www.zoemurphy.com

Based in Margate-on-Sea and inspired by the glittery and grotty seaside town. A developing collection of hand printed and recycled, furniture and textiles.

I’m in FULL preparation mode for CREFFT - my creative retreat in Wales next month & getting to catch up with so many tal...
21/08/2025

I’m in FULL preparation mode for CREFFT - my creative retreat in Wales next month & getting to catch up with so many talented local producers that help to make the week so special for our guests. Last year we were lucky enough to have some gorgeous little soaps from Alex at who makes the most beautiful eco & cruelty-free toiletries from sustainable ingredients here in Pembrokeshire.
She learned how to make soap as a young girl from her Aunt Helena who would, grow, rear, and make many things from scratch. The Narberth Soap Company’s products can be found in markets and independent retailers all over Pembrokeshire and it has felt super fitting over the years to send our guests home with a little bit of her produce in their departure gift bag.
Thankyou to Alex for sharing your beautiful craft with us as we make our own creative products on our screen-printing trips. If you’re reading this and you want a bit of Welsh wellness sent to you from the rolling hill of West Wales : go and take a look at her website or head to one of the fairs where she’ll be this summer 🩷🧼🌸🌊

Geese flying over Cardigan last week on my visit to the Welsh studio. Made me think of this Mary Oliver poem (swipe to s...
06/08/2025

Geese flying over Cardigan last week on my visit to the Welsh studio. Made me think of this Mary Oliver poem (swipe to see) for not the first time this month. I’ve always loved these words because they remind me of a kind of surrender to your self and your own human heart. It’s as if it’s saying ‘whatever you feel about who you are, you have a place here just like everything else in nature and are wanted and loved by the world’.

Did you know that I’ve set up a print making studio in West Wales? 😍I started creating it in time for my first retreat b...
05/08/2025

Did you know that I’ve set up a print making studio in West Wales? 😍
I started creating it in time for my first retreat back in 2023 and it’s where I come to in order to print large pieces of fabric, big runs of products that are too many to comfortably fit in the Margate workshop, and where I run ‘Crefft’ - my week long creative retreat in September 😍.

The studio space is a huge old brick building with double height doors that used to be something to do with the shipping and sailing activity that takes place on the pier at the end of the road.

One of my favourite features of the space is the big long overgrown area of private outdoor corridor that runs behind the building and against the old Welsh stone wall. It’s currently overgrown to high heaven, but this year is the year we’re going to get it tidied up and ready for retreat guests next month. A space to relax, birdwatch, dye fabrics and dine (hopefully!) once we get the patio down.

The first job has been to dig up all of the rubble and soil that’s full of rubbish and metal left by the previous tenant, and in the process we found the corner of an original slate patio! 😍

So here’s a little photo of work in progress (please see the mark on the wall that shows just how high the dirt was) and watch this space for more pictures of it when we’ve finished and landscaped it.
If you want to hear more about the week of creativity I’m running here in September, drop me a message (or comment below) and I’ll send you a link with all of the info 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿💚

A week in some pictures! Back in West Wales preparing for this years creative retreat PLUS helping out with the fabulous...
04/08/2025

A week in some pictures! Back in West Wales preparing for this years creative retreat PLUS helping out with the fabulous on their screen printing stand at the 🩷 Also made this week: some candlesticks, some scrap packs, a stand for stock at the Margate store, and PAPRIKA PEANUT BUTTER 🥜💥😻

What weather do you think of when you imagine attending a creative retreat in South Wales? 😍 I’ve discovered it to be on...
03/08/2025

What weather do you think of when you imagine attending a creative retreat in South Wales? 😍 I’ve discovered it to be one of the most intriguing things about running my printing holiday here (where we have the first day exploring and drawing outdoors). As the crow flies the location is in the middle between mountainous Snowdonia, and the warmest parts of Cornwall - and that’s kind of how I would describe the climate too. First thing in the morning you can be sploshed with almost tropical raindrops, heavy round and watery, and then by lunchtime you’ll need your sun cream and your hat on. It is disarming how mixed it is, and entices you into a state of complete surrender and acceptance of anything. The rural Welsh ‘look’ is very much wellies, bare legs, a fresh face and a tan, and I don’t think I could want more for a creative experience if I had planned it. I LOVE how varied the time spent here can be, how nothing is certain and no colour or sky or outfit is set. It feeds in really nicely to the way I approach my own creativity : ‘we thought we wanted it to be like *this*, but now this other thing has happened and we found we prefer that instead’. Anyone I’ve ever taught will know that I very much believe in a serendipitous way of working with anything, and now that I teach people on a holiday here - I can even get the skies involved with that too 😍

Thankyou Welsh weather for always showing me and my amazing guests how to hold expectations loosely, and to trust the process and the potential in any given moment. That’s not just for artwork and printing, that’s for everything 🩷☀️
(If you want to spend a week with me and other wonderful folks, considering these kind of ways of seeing the world, click on the link in my bio to find out more about booking a slot on our autumn trip 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿)

More little scrap packs are heading to the Margate studio store for this weekend. You know me : trying to save the plane...
31/07/2025

More little scrap packs are heading to the Margate studio store for this weekend. You know me : trying to save the planet one shred of material at a time, and so I never want to bin any piece of colour or pattern if I think someone else might find a use for it. I save them all up over the weeks of drawing, colour testing and print runs, and then squeeze them into little paper packs of scraps for someone to take home and collage with. I can’t seem to keep them on the shelves, but they will only be for sale at in person at the Margate store as they take quite a bit of time to cut and pack. They are a work of heart from me to the recycling spirits. 🩷♻️✂️

Does it seem funny to you that the Margate girl isn’t doing her annual creative retreat in Margate? 😁Here’s what the Wel...
20/07/2025

Does it seem funny to you that the Margate girl isn’t doing her annual creative retreat in Margate? 😁

Here’s what the Welsh experience is for me and why I love to bring others here to share in it….

(Please swipe through to see it all roll out for you in picture tiles because apparently I have far too much sentiment for a social media caption. 😆🩷❌)

🌿A word on having a pause and trust in yourself. ✨ One of the sweetest chats I had while doing some artistry and letteri...
18/07/2025

🌿A word on having a pause and trust in yourself. ✨
One of the sweetest chats I had while doing some artistry and lettering at this month was with , an incredible voice coach and for that week - one of the liaison for the speakers. At one point in one of our conversations she said a simple phrase to me in a very solemn and knowing way “you have time. There is enough time”. It was in relation to a chat about trying to fit lots in and be lots of things, and what it does to our bodies and our progress. Her gentle phrase is still ringing quietly around in my ears. The sentiment I’m trying to embody at the moment, and what I certainly left this years event with is just this:

There is enough time to create everything that I could want and need, but more often than not it will require me to sit still and listen, be, & focus. Those actions feel like the opposite of productive energy and it’s easy to believe that working/thinking all hours and using all reserves means that I will get to an island of time where there is a gap enough to reflect and re-route. But if I/you can’t make time to pause in this moment, why do I sometimes think it will be any easier to be able to in the next. Pouring more energy into ‘rush’ and ‘push’ is simply casting a vote for it (and telling yourself that you deserve only that), and that’s what Charlotte’s phrase reminded me of.

I’m someone who deeply trusts my own intuition and values and so if something feels good and nutritious and right for me, however absurd or bold, I usually have enough courage to go after it (or to say no to it in the opposite). That alone feels like a gift, so the work in this season seems to be about getting quiet and trusting the process of making space so that the little voice of intuition can navigate me. 💚

I say all of that in case you are also someone who could do with remembering-to-remember your own sovereignty. 😊 My own to-do list is still super long, but those quiet moments of listening to my self have me putting all of that DO-ing into my most-loved parts of the list, and trusting that I deserve a peaceful time of it.

📸 by the fab

Speaking of cards… I’ve just recently dropped off some of my hand printed greetings cards in a Welsh language/theme to t...
18/07/2025

Speaking of cards… I’ve just recently dropped off some of my hand printed greetings cards in a Welsh language/theme to the fabulous in Newport! Printed in my Welsh textile printing studio (where we run every year) these are like mini prints that people often tell me that they pop in a frame after enjoying as a note.

Also available in ‘Margate’s local dialect 😆 on my website (and in the Margate store) but if you want these 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿 ones, head to Codi in Pembrokeshire 🙌🏻😍

Some ink drawings of flowers from this week, soon to be used in a customer commission and perhaps also some cards for th...
17/07/2025

Some ink drawings of flowers from this week, soon to be used in a customer commission and perhaps also some cards for the store.
Please also note the table cloth that I picked up from a charity shop (with napkins) because it is EXACTLY the same as the fabric that the curtains in my childhood bedroom were made from. Anyone know the origin before I ask my mum? Is it ?

Just three of these sweet Welsh blanket pin cushions in the online shop & Margate store at the moment! In gorgeous rust ...
17/07/2025

Just three of these sweet Welsh blanket pin cushions in the online shop & Margate store at the moment! In gorgeous rust and candy pink (swipe to see)

Fresh back from a busy seven days of helping out at the brilliant : a thinking persons festival of talks, workshops, fo...
16/07/2025

Fresh back from a busy seven days of helping out at the brilliant : a thinking persons festival of talks, workshops, food, camping & community in West Wales. I contribute to the sign writing & set up, and it means that I have the lucky opportunity to spend time with the incredible team for the week, usually in the sunshine, drinking and eating food 🩷. We spend a lot of time and love to make the experience feel as special and significant for the guests as we can, but inevitably we get to absorb some of that reverence and value as well. Not just in the talks (although the likes of can be part of the fantastic roster of speakers) but even in contributing to an event that whispers/shouts ‘reflecting on things is important’, ‘pouring into you life and your surroundings is important’, ‘making positive change for yourself and for others is important’. It’s an experience that encourages you to pause and then move differently as a result, and the friendships and memories made make it even more nutritious.
Every year that I’ve been I take a lot away from the week, and I would say that it’s the biggest contributing factor to me setting up my own creative retreat for each September. I see the difference that a week of focus and friendship can do to transform every person taking part. It encourages me to pour into the ‘Do’ experience of excellence, warmth, and welcome, and then riding the wave of all of that good energy I use my creativity and knowledge to roll out my own miniature print-based week two months later. 💚 It’s a good example of how multiplying it can be to take a leap of faith and throw yourself into something with a smile and a hope of success.

Phew! Time for a cup of tea, a finished moment of reflection, and then I’m on to making and preparing for my own hosted week that starts in two months time 😍

Thankyou to the cheerful and kind for the amazing photography 📸

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Studio 24, Hawley Street
Margate
CT91QA

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