AN ARTIST has turned her home into her very own palace by painting a mural of Brighton Pavilion across the front of it.

Kaye Teale, 53, decided to brighten up her Freshfield Street house in Brighton by recreating the iconic building using her home as a canvas after clearing ivy that had covered the front wall for a decade.

It took Kaye six weeks to complete but the biggest challenge for the art teacher was scaling the top floor of her house because of her severe fear of heights.

She said: “At the top it was horrendous. I had to take a friend up with me and I tied myself to the scaffolding with a dog harness.

“The first time I went up there I spent most of my time on my stomach. I don’t know how I got it finished.

“I’ve always had vertigo but needs must, I just had to carry on.

“I had to edit some of the lines because my hand was shaking all over the place – my friend was just laughing at me.

“I kept thinking somehow I was going to fall though a crack in the scaffolding.”

But Kaye powered through and spent a couple of hours painting two or three times a week and is delighted with the end product.

She said: “I am really pleased with it. I did my homework and made sure the design was precise, so then it was just a case of executing it. People are just so happy with it – they’ve been knocking on my door, taking pictures of it and they were cheering me on when I was painting.

“It’s seemed to have cheered them up, and I think we needed cheering up.”

With half of the Pavilion on Kaye’s house, she is hoping her next-door neighbour will commission the other half on his house.

She added: “I spoke to him the other day and he wasn’t too keen, but if there’s enough interest and it would add value to the property, you just never know.”

Kaye starts her art classes on Tuesday nights at the beginning of November at the Hanover Community Centre.

Anyone wishing to join can email kayeteale61@hotmail.com.