Claire Duende was born in Ghana, West Africa of an English father and Spanish mother. After a few years living in Beirut and Spain, she grew up primarily in the Oxfordshire countryside where she would avoid doing her homework on Sunday afternoons by watching old Hollywood movies. Among her favourites were films with Sabu.

Claire has spent most of her life working as a designer and lives in an old cottage in Cornwall, England with her husband and four dogs. Their son and daughter have now flown the nest but leave their city lives from time to time to bring light and laughter into the family home.