Inside Rana Begum's minimalist studio & house surrounded by nature in London

[Rama] I know that there's a lot of people that say

that you can't have kids, family, and a career

and do all the things that you wanna do,

but actually my kids were the drive to make this work.

I wanted to be able to prioritize them and my work.

[gentle music]

I'm Rana Begum.

I'm a visual artist and I live and work in London.

I grew up partly in Bangladesh

and partly in the UK, in Hertfordshire.

In Bangladesh I grew up on a farm in the countryside.

I remember spending a lot of time staring at the water

or the rice field and just seeing the kind of the movement

in the rain.

I just remember being mesmerized by the effect

of light on surfaces, and those bits and pieces of memories

stuck with me and still influence my work.

I collaborated with the architect Peter Culley

on this project.

He spent a lot of time observing me and my children,

but also observing how my team and I work.

He recognized how much I needed to see the impact of light.

The site consists of two buildings

and the building is connected via a bridge.

And so when you come in, you're kind of walking

underneath one of the building,

and as you go through the red door, it splits.

So you either go straight to the studio

or you go upstairs to the flat.

The level change, you can see that it's dropped down,

then it goes up again to allow some skylight

for some natural light to come through.

And it's so important for my work

and you can see the difference it makes.

So this is without any artificial light.

And you can see how the orange impacts the pink

and the pink just glows.

[footsteps thudding]

It took us 10 years from buying to planning,

to demolition, to building, and then moving in.

I wanted this to be a home,

but at the same time a space that gave you room to think.

This is one of my favorite artworks, which is by Tess Jaray,

an artist that I assisted for about five years.

She's like my mentor.

This wall was built to house the painting.

I wanted this to be kind of the main thing in the house,

if you like.

The kitchen is designed so that the kids can cook as well.

They love cooking and that's something that we do together.

I'm quite short, so the main thing had to be

that everything needed to be accessible.

And when the leaves fall, I wanted to kind of keep

a bit of that green in the space,

so this is one of the reason why we chose the Terrazzo.

The way Peter's designed some of the skylights,

I just love the way that the light just kind of comes

into the space and you get this kind of soft curve.

[gentle music]

On this side of the bookshelf is my private studio.

And I wanted something that allowed me to kind of separate

the space and not block the view either.

So Steve, my partner, who's a structural engineer,

has designed this beautiful bookshelf

with leftover stone from a building.

Having a separate studio from the main studio

has been really helpful.

There are moments where I want my own space

and I want to be able to kind of work on things

that doesn't get in the way of the team doing stuff.

I love actually in the morning when I get a chance

to sit here and do my watercolors

and have this view with the light kind of coming in.

Peter and I spent a long time thinking about

how the light changes in the space,

'cause initially it was meant to be kind of a light gray

stairs, but having lived here and seen how it feels

with the different season and the different kind of light,

it needed something warm, and we settled on this pink,

which I felt just works beautifully with the light.

I still love this, the difference in the scale of the space,

the living room, the kitchen feels more open

and you can have more people and friends and family over,

whereas the bedrooms feel really cozy and intimate.

I've been slowly building furniture in the flat,

and this is the last wardrobe I have to build,

and I've just finished building it,

but I haven't quite decided on the handles.

I have just come up with this idea of this tape

until I've made a decision on my handles.

But I'm gonna go for something that's quite minimal.

I love waking up naturally to the morning light.

But the kids, they were desperate to have some curtains.

So I got a quote and it was absolutely ridiculous.

I think they were like, two grand each or something,

or three grand, and I thought, There is no way I'm spending

that money on curtains.

So I just went into this shop in Hackney

and they sell felt with this kind of rough edge.

I just love it and it's just really soft.

And actually the cats haven't attacked these at all.

[gentle music]

This is the bathroom.

It's made up of reflector tiles, a material

that you see out there in the street.

This is a material that I use a lot in my work.

The plastic facing means that it's refracting light.

It just really changes depending on the time of the day.

[gentle music] [footsteps tapping]

I really wanted one of the terrace to be representative

as Islamic garden.

I love the fact that we've got this pomegranate tree,

and we've actually had one pomegranate,

which I really hoped the squirrels hadn't seen it.

They'd eaten it, the whole thing.

Not a single pip left.

[gentle music]

You can see the shard.

There's the church, [indistinct], Finsbury park,

and the sunset is just absolutely spectacular.

[gentle music resumes]

You know, when you're living and working in this building,

you feel the seasons are very much part of your life.

It doesn't feel like we're living in London.

I love how close we are to nature.

[gentle music resumes]