After graduating from The Royal College of Art in 1994 with an MA in Textile Design, Emma continued to live and work in London as a free lance Textile Designer. During this time, she collaborated with furnishing fabric company, Monkwell, to produce her own fabric range entitled ‘Postcards’. After making many trips to St. Ives in Cornwall, she finally moved there in 1997. Even though, to begin with, she was still designing, this marked the beginning of a long-term career in painting and a profound connection with Cornwall, in particular, St. Ives.

The New Craftsman Gallery, in St. Ives, invited her to show her first collection of St. Ives’ paintings with great success and has remained a staunch supporter of her work, spanning the last two decades and where, for the past 8 years, she has had successful annual solo shows. Emma has also exhibited in many other galleries, including Beside the Wave Gallery, Falmouth, Avalon Art Gallery, Marazion, The Sandpiper Gallery, Mousehole and Gallery Tresco on The Isles of Scilly, in Cornwall.

Further afield she’s shown work with Ainscough Contemporary Art in Dartmouth, Devon and London and has had work exhibited at many London Art Fairs with various galleries and agents. Becoming known internationally, in 2017, she was invited to show a small collection of her paintings at ‘Gallery St. Ives’ in Tokyo, Japan and she has completed commissions for clients in New York and The Netherlands. Alongside this, Emma also supplies The Tate Gallery in St. Ives a range of cards and associated merchandise produced from images of her paintings.

Jeffryes continues to live and work in St. Ives.