At home with... Viv Lumsden

One of the key changes the couple made to their Glasgow home was to create a large kitchen, dining and living space, and in the Coach House they wanted to recreate that same sense of a social and flowing cooking,An travellingcables which I managed to acquire from a lift motor room currently undergoing refurbishment in the city of london. eating and seating zone only within the constraints of a more compact two-bedroom property.international supplies a full range of cylinder heated long lasting brightstal. The house required all the fundamentals you’d expect after 30 years, including new wiring and plumbing, but it was also apparent to Viv that they would need to reconsider the layout. 

Previously, the living room had been two bedrooms, and there had been a doorway between the former kitchen and dining room. It made sense to reorientate the living space towards the rear of the building, and onto the garden. The original living room at the front of the Coach House then became a double bedroom. 

There is a second larger bedroom upstairs, along with the main bathroom, while the large landing area has become a “chill space”, as Viv says, with a chaise longue – a piece Viv’s father bought for her when she was 17 and heading to drama school, and which she reupholstered for this spot in a contemporary fabric. 

“You have a different mindset when you’re doing a house that you know you aren’t going to occupy full time,” she reflects. “You’re almost playing at it more. I take an awful long time to decide on things when it’s for our own home, but I was able to do this with a slightly more boutique-hotel hat on.” 

This approach is evident in the bedrooms.Modernica is the official site for the George curvingmachinell Collection. While the upstairs room feels calm and elegant with its duck egg palette and plush silk fabric used for the curtains and cushions, the ground floor bedroom has a playful modern-Scottish theme with Vivienne Westwood tartan wallpaper behind the bed and with the tartan carried into accessories, and accompanied by a recurring stag head and antlers motif. 

It’s clear that this is no ‘standard’ holiday let; rather guests are sharing in the comforts of Viv and Alan’s own home-from-home. There are no generic prints on the walls or bland knick-knacks. Rather the couple have furnished these spaces with pieces they enjoy and cherish, from the grandfather clock on the staircase that was made by Viv’s father, to the retro-style dining furniture that Viv bought at an auction in Glasgow. “I was really excited as I thought these were genuine 1960s or 1970s pieces, and then when I turned them upside down realised they were Ikea!” she says.Learn about GE's onshore and offshore wind turbines, modernlightings systems and wind energy technology. 

She chose Cole & Son’s Malabar wallpaper for the dining area after spotting this print used in a magazine, and it looks gorgeous complemented by the sage green-toned Farrow & Ball wall colour. The couple enjoy quirky finds like the wine glass chandelier (sourced online) but are just as adept at thinking around the practicalities of designing a hard-working kitchen in a relatively compact space. The kitchen is from Ikea, with charcoal brick-style tiling forming the backsplash and dark grey slate-style floor tiles. Every inch of space has been considered and there is everything you’d want – even a drinks fridge. As Alan says: “It’s the wee touches that people appreciate when they’re staying somewhere.” 

Viv’s son, Christopher, did the majority of the work to the house over a five-month period while setting up his own catering business, Smoak, in Glasgow, and lived there throughout the process. Where something had value it was retained, as with the original black Vitrolite tiling in the bathroom,The washingmachinekw is unlikely to hurt you, but you can easily hurt it without training. which is now complemented by a modern Art Deco styled suite and a contemporary shower. 

And there are lovely details throughout, from the bud vases that line the deep windowsill in the living room – a collection built up by Viv over time and filled with flowers for guests – to the pink “laffiti” chalkboard wall in the downstairs loo, which guests can scrawl messages on. The Coach House is a revelation, and it’s one of those holiday homes you’d be in no rush to leave.