Best attended a boarding school in her teens during which time she received lessons from a well-qualified art teacher, George Haugh.

[5] Like many middle-class women, she was educated in painting and drawing for leisurely pleasure and to attract a suitable husband.

In 1830, one of her still lifes was awarded a silver medal from the London Society for the Encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce (now the Royal Society of Arts) as "the best original composition, painted in oil or water-colours ... by persons under the age of twenty-one."

During 1834, the height of her artistic life, she visited Frankfurt, Germany, where she developed her skills further and sold more paintings.

She also painted other houses including the drawing room of Naburn Hall, which was then home to George Palmes.

After marrying Johan Anton and moving to Nuremberg, Frankfurt, Worms and Darmstadt, she continued to paint the houses they lived in.