Rosie Osborne grew up between St Ives, Cornwall and London. At the age of 14, she interviewed the celebrated abstract painter Sandra Blow in her Cornish studio - a formative experience that inspired Rosie to begin practising photography following her first visit to Paris in 2005. The photographs she took on that trip later formed her debut solo exhibition, Exposed, in London at the age of 17. The show sold out in just three days.

 

That same year, Rosie won Best Photograph of the Year 2006 in a London photographic competition and became the last person to photograph the abstract artist Denis Bowen in his London home. She went on to study Politics, History of Art, English Literature and French at Richmond Upon Thames College, where her English tutor, Hugh Epstein, encouraged her to sit an extension exam in Creative Writing. She was awarded a distinction.

 

At 19, Rosie held her second solo exhibition, Edge, at The Brighton Media Centre Gallery, selling all of her framed photo collages in a single evening. She received a scholarship to study at Sussex University, where she continued her studies in English Literature and French. During this time, she wrote a thesis on the historical and cultural significance of street art in modern-day France, travelling across the country to interview artists such as Jef Aérosol and Christian Guémy.

 

After graduating from university in June 2012, Rosie moved to the Marais district of Paris to work, write and live. She began working in interior design, expanding the business she worked for into Italy and managing a portfolio of luxury properties in Florence, Rome, Tuscany and Venice. In 2013, she designed and managed the full renovation of her own apartment in the Marais, with the transformation featured in ELLE Maison.

 

Returning to London in 2015, Rosie founded Free Spirits, continuing to interview and photograph artists, writers, photographers and visionaries around the world. She curated the group exhibition The World’s Mine Oyster in Shoreditch, London in December 2016.

 

In 2017, Rosie co-founded Startup Sisters with her sister Sophie, curating and sourcing stock for interior design pop-up shops across London. In 2019, she published Free Spirits, her first book, featuring interviews with artists including Sandra Blow, Danny Fox, Guy Yanai, Erin Lawlor, Samuel Bassett and Sylvette David. The book launched at Porthmeor Studios in St Ives on 18th October 2019; it was stocked by Tate St Ives the following day, with half the available copies selling out within a week. Subsequent launches followed at White City House in London (25 October 2019), Paris (29 November 2019) and the Miles McEnery Gallery in New York City (January 2020).

 

In 2020, Rosie founded The New St Ives School, an artists’ residency designed to foster artistic exchange and experimentation in the heart of St Ives, nurturing a new generation of artists shaping the town’s future. That year, she travelled to New York to interview and photograph Katherine Bradford and Jules de Balincourt, and welcomed six artists to the residency: Baxter Dury, Elizabeth Fraser, Kingsley Ifill, Ariana Papademetropoulos, Paz Lenchantin and Gwenno.

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In 2021, she rented a gallery in Newlyn, Cornwall and co-founded an ephemeral gallery called The End is Nigh, curating exhibitions featuring Cornish artists such as Becky Tyrrell and Nick Pumphrey.

 

In 2022, Rosie opened Rose Lane, a Grade II listed shop on the cobbled street of The Digey in St Ives. Restoring the space with Victorian floorboards and apothecary-style fittings, she curated a collection of antiques, paintings and ephemera, later taking the brand to pop-up locations in Penzance and Falmouth.

 

In 2024, Rosie worked closely with her mother, Lynda Davies, on her memoir, spending time together in a cottage in Cadgwith, Cornwall, to edit and prepare the manuscript. Rosie published her mother's memoir, Just Me, later that year, marking its release with a book launch and a reading by Lynda at Rose Lane.

 

Rosie is currently expanding the Rose Lane brand to a farm in rural Cornwall, creating a showroom of antiques that also offers interior design consulting. The farm will also host wellness retreats, talks and art events.

 

Rosie now lives in Falmouth with her fiancé, Patrick, and their ragdoll cat, Misty.