Paine’s first professional job, aged only nineteen, was as the Clerk of Works supervising the building of Nostell Priory, Yorkshire (c.1737–1750), designed by Colonel James Moyser, a friend of Lord Burlington.

[1] From the 1750s, he had his own practice, and designed many villas, usually consisting of a central building, often with a fine staircase, and two symmetrical wings.

From 1770 to 1776, he built New Wardour Castle in Wiltshire (which featured as the Royal Ballet School in the film Billy Elliot).

His practice declined in his later years as he refused to participate in the Neoclassical fashions established by the Adam brothers.

Charlotte married St John Charlton on 22 December 1781, who later became High Sheriff of Shropshire in 1790 and the couple lived at Apley Castle.

In 1764, Reynolds painted a joint portrait of James Paine father and son pictured above (now in the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford).

It was eventually acquired by the art dealer C.J Wertheimer but when it was shown at Burlington House in 1908, it was catalogued as Portraits of the Misses Paine, their mother Charlotte having been painted out to increase its sale value.

In 1935, the Lady Lever Art Gallery Trustees took the decision to remove the over painting and restored Mrs Paine to her rightful place.

[clarification needed] In 2017, the Friends of Mansion House, Doncaster led on the James Paine Festival, celebrating his life and work on the 300th anniversary of his birth.