Some businesses begin because they were simply meant to be, it seems. One such came into being a couple of years ago by mistake - or by happy chance, whichever way you look at it.

Maite Alegre, originally from the Rioja wine-growing region of Spain, acquired several pots of paint when HM Customs refused her sister, who was returning to Spain, permission to take it on board a plane at Heathrow.

Back home in Yarnton, where Maite lives with partner Carlos and children Manuella, 18, Daniel, 16, and six-year-old Shade, she used the paint to experiment with painting furniture in the continental style.

Made by Oxford interior decorator Annie Sloan - one of whose courses Maite's sister had been attending - the paint was ideal for her purpose, producing an understated matt look on armoires, tables, chairs, lamps - indeed almost anything.

Ms Alegre said: "The paint is perfect for me, because it contains chalk and there is nothing plastic about it. I love it."

Now, two years on, she is opening a workshop and showroom in an old milking parlour at Osney Hill Farm, on the main A4095 between Long Hanborough and Witney, and a shop at Tetbury in Gloucestershire.

She added: "It is scary, but it is going better than Carlos and I dared hope. Of course, there are frightening ups and downs but I am breaking even already."

Accident may have been at the root of her inspiration for the business but hard work has brought her to the point of incurring overheads.

She also took a decorating course with Annie Sloan, then another course at Les Tuileries in Dorking, and then yet another at a chateau in Luxembourg, before finally taking the plunge and taking on premises.

She said: "Ten years ago I was divorced in Spain and came to England with two children for a complete change. First, I worked here as a waitress in a restaurant in Little Clarendon Street, Oxford, then I learned the furniture trade by working at Fade in Woodstock.

"What I love about England is that creativity is really valued here, and so is enterprise."

She added: "Now I think I have found what I enjoy doing. Carlos, who runs a business training executives, with clients including accountants PricewaterhouseCoopers, helps to restore furniture.

"Sometimes we buy things and simply sell them on at a profit, but mainly what I like doing is improving things, adding value. I want to do something, not just buy and sell. It's satisfaction as much as money that I am after."

The day I met Ms Alegre at her workshop she had just returned from a furniture fair in London, which required her getting up at 4am, and would shortly being going on to her daughter's 18th birthday party.

Here, clearly, was someone who had tackled the work-life balance in a novel way.

Stock was short, as a consignment of painted furniture had just gone off to Tetbury, where she has taken space in an antiques store called Top Banana.

Among items being painted was a cupboard from which chicken wire had recently been removed and replaced with panels. It was destined for the estate manager's house at Prince Charles' Highgrove estate.

It all seems a long way from Ms Alegre's first commission after the airport incident when, after increasing her confidence by rummaging through skips to find pieces to paint, a friend entrusted her with a dressing table of great sentimental value to improve - and the project was a resounding success.

What Ms Alegre calls her wise-up and wake-up' call came when a shrewd furniture dealer commissioned her to do a stream of work.

She said: "That was when I realised there is a boom in the fashion for painted furniture in England and that there is fantastic potential for me in simply doing what I like doing."

Now, despite the shop and the showroom, a major part of the business is still taking commissions from people who have valued furniture which they would like to refurbish. And not only furniture either. Ms Alegre explained: "I have just painted some steps in a Cotswold cottage, and I also paint patterns on beams, and have also completed a mural.

There is enormous opportunity here."

And why did she choose Tetbury instead of somewhere nearer home for her shop?

She said: "I used to work in Woodstock, so I didn't want to upset anyone by starting too near. Also, I heard that Tetbury is becoming an accepted centre for painted furniture.

"And I have a good deal from Top Banana. They sell the furniture, leaving me free to buy it and paint it."

o Contact: Maite Alegre, 07920 282272