Paula Sharples was born in Brighton on the south coast in 1951. She gained a degree in Textile Design at Reigate School of Art in Surrey in the late 60's and spent 15 years as a freelance textile designer for the international furnishing and bedding market, creating designs for companies such as Coloroll and John Wolf Decorative Fabrics in the USA and also Portmeirion and Churchill China.

​The landscape surrounding her home in the Peak District and the North Norfolk coast, Devon and Cornwall, have all significantly influenced her work.

She works on gesso prepared board with acrylics, ink and graphite in layers and uses a combination of still life with landscape background. She also paints on gold leaf which she finds beautiful to work on and gives her work a different feel. Her use of colour and pattern is evidence of her past in textile and ceramic design.