We're a bit like the Primrose Hill set, only without the shagging," jokes Lisa Whatmough, founder of the furniture reupholstery business Squint, of her fashion-crowd friends. She is one of the leading lights of the East End design scene, so it's no surprise that she moves in fashionable circles - her close friends include the jewellerydesignerLara Bohincand Dan Crouch, co-owner of cool Camden pub the Lock Tavern. "In the 1990s, we were always going to each other's club nights, but priorities change as you get older," she says. "Now it's more about sitting at home and drinking tea together."
That's not the only change that comes with age. "I feel so much more confident in my thirties than I did in my twenties," says Whatmough, 39. "When I was an impoverished painter, straight out of college, I felt like I was constantly having to second-guess myself, but now I have the courage of my convictions and never worry about what people think of me. Having said that, it's still great when people want to buy my furniture."
Whatmough's business takes run-down furniture - from chaises longues and chairs to lamps and mirrors - and reupholsters them in a riotous patchwork of fabric, in colours that ought to clash, but somehow seem to work.
When she set up the company two years ago in Redchurch Street, E2, Whatmough brought a new kind of energy to the area. "The East End was more about white minimalist galleries, and some people were a bit surprised by my use of colour." She soon charmed the locals, though, choosing to move just down the road when seeking larger premises last year. And she now counts her neighbours as best friends, including the Trois Garçons guys from the eponymous restaurant across the street.
It's not been an easy ride, though. "It's only now, after three years, that I can go down to working six days a week," Whatmough says. "I believe that you have to plan in blocks of years, rather than of seven days, so you say, 'I'll work hard this year, and hopefully will be able to take four weeks off next year.'"
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So how does a woman who works all week manage her home life? By using her three-bedroom end-of-terrace home in Hackney as an extension of her Shoreditch store. "My home is fluid," she says. "I finish some furniture for an order and it will be in my house until it's ready to be delivered. When it's gone, I get something else to fill its place - I don't have any emotional pull to it." This lack of sentimentality about £5,000 sofas doesn't extend to family heirlooms, such as a pair of sunglasses that belonged to her mother - her family are her biggest supporters and the source of her entrepreneurial drive. "My mum was her own boss, running shops and businesses, and bringing up three children on the way," Whatmough says.
With a design background that includes a degree in fine art from Winchester School of Art (with the installation artist Richard Woods and Alasdhair Willis of Established & Sons as classmates), Whatmough cites the sculptural talents of the artist Louise Bourgeois and the design skills of Terence Conran as inspiration. When painting didn't work out, she began going to auctions and furniture fairs to pick up the pieces she uses. "Nineteenth-century English furniture works best, because of its clean lines," she says. "Sometimes, the French stuff can be too ornate. It makes the loud colours look too fussy."
It's this appreciation of shape and colour that stops Whatmough's house, though filled with Squint furniture, from being overwhelming. By setting bright pieces against white walls and smooth lines, the designer has created a haven to which she can retreat.
"I'm so busy that I'm actually less available than my friends who have babies," she says, not that she has sacrificed having a family for her work. "I think it is possible to have a family and a career, but I've never felt that hormonal desire to have children. And with kids, I wouldn't have had the time to run Squint. Anyway, I don't feel like I'm missing out - Stanley, my beagle from a rescue centre, is definitely my substitute son."
A new-found inclination to delegate saw the designer take on a full-time seamster, Lucas McKenna, last Christmas, but that doesn't mean Whatmough is about to start relaxing: there's a project under way with Swarovski, and products are being sold to boutiques in Milan and the Hamptons. "I'm so happy with what I do, and I get a genuine rush from walking through the shop door," she says. "I couldn't ask for more than that."
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Squint; 020 7739 9275, www.squintlimited.com