How an evolving approach to interior design helped the Grier

INTERIOR design may have started out as an interest for Kerrie Grier, but it has now evolved into both a passion and a business with The Unique Home Company, an interior design service Kerrie has launched with her business partner – an online shop follows later this spring.

So it comes as little surprise that the home Kerrie shares with her husband Colin and their children – daughter Jessica, 7, and one-year-old son Angus – in Edinburgh’s West End has an immaculate and welcoming interior filled with inspired design touches. The dining-kitchen perhaps says the most about Kerrie’s approach: she designed the kitchen herself and had the cabinets handmade by a carpenter and hand-painted by a specialist painter, and evolved the kitchen over a period of time, adding more wall cabinets to increase the storage and then adding open shelving along one wall.

Smeg’s FAB28 fridge-freezer adds a touch of retro styling while the stainless steel range cooker is contemporary, as is the tap that complements the Belfast sink. It’s an eclectic look; a look that took time to consider and create.

Likewise, Kerrie and Colin, who is joint owner of an IT company based in Glasgow, didn’t rush into redesigning this three-bedroom flat at 10/3 Douglas Crescent after buying it three-and-a-half-years ago, initially preferring to live with it as it was to get a feel for the spaces. The couple had been living in a five-bedroom farmhouse in Stirlingshire when they decided to relocate to Edinburgh when Jessica started school at The Mary Erskine School.

It’s easy to understand what attracted them to this property. Douglas Crescent looks onto the private residents’ gardens that extend down to the Water of Leith and the views from this first-floor Victorian drawing room apartment are striking.

The flat is generously proportioned and filled with light from its tall windows. As it was the interior felt tired, but Kerrie and Colin had no problem seeing past this to its potential. “When I go into a house, I don’t particularly want to pay for someone else’s taste,” Kerrie says. “I can see the structure and the shape and size of the space, and I can see the original features.”

The couple didn’t initially envisage doing a huge amount of work here – they weren’t intending to stay as long as they have, but changed their minds as they grew to love the flat and the area. The property did need some fundamental improvements – the windows had to be renovated and the carpeting was lifted to reveal the original floorboards, which were repaired where necessary (by Stockbridge Flooring), and stripped and stained in a beautifully rich hue. The plaster cornicing in the dining-kitchen had been damaged over the years and the couple brought in a specialist to replace this.

The plaster detailing in both the drawing room and the master bedroom reflects the elegance of this period home, and Kerrie’s approach to the interior enhances this while giving the spaces a more contemporary edge. Asked about her style, she says: “I’m probably a romantic at heart,” and this is reflected in the shades-of-cream and off-white painted furniture that hints at a French country aesthetic, and in the damask wallpapers that add understated glamour.

“I’m not a big fan of cheap and cheerful; I’ve had most of these pieces for years,” Kerrie says. The bed in the master bedroom is the first piece of furniture she bought for herself some 15 years ago, and it was an expensive purchase at the time. “I had to really save for this,” she says, but given its longevity it was clearly a worthwhile investment.

Kerrie credits her love of interiors to her mother who embraced the mantra of quality not quantity. “My mum still has a lot of the same furniture that she had when we were growing up and it still looks good; they’re classic pieces,” she says, acknowledging that this influenced her own approach. “I tend to start designing a room with an item rather than a colour,” she explains.

When designing her son’s bedroom, for example, she began with a grey throw, which was the inspiration for the Lamp Room Gray wall colour by Farrow & Ball (the chalky wall colours throughout are all Farrow & Ball, as is the wallpaper in the master bedroom). Although grey may seem like an unusual choice for a child’s room, this sort hue works beautifully alongside the white furniture from The White Company. “When I was shopping for children’s furniture I found you could get white or pink or blue or wood, but nothing in between,” Kerrie says, so The Unique Home Company has teamed up with manufacturers down south to create a range of pieces that can be painted to order in any Farrow & Ball shade.

Jessica’s room, meanwhile, feels just as 
stylish with the combination of crisp white furniture and delicately printed wallpaper by Laura Ashley in soft pink and again the warmly hued floorboards add depth to the palette.

Living with this interior as it was initially and taking time to make decisions was a savvy approach – as Kerrie says, you don’t want to make a mistake when you’re investing in top quality paint and wallpaper. The bathroom fittings were already here and Kerrie made the look her own with new décor and accessories. And while she might have opted for an Aga as her first choice in range cookers, here the stainless steel range feels like the ideal choice for an urban flat.

While the voluminous drawing room is the obvious highlight, the dining-kitchen feels like the space to be in this flat. By designing something from scratch and choosing a bespoke route, mixing old and new, country with contemporary, Kerrie has created a room you just want to spend time in; it’s as comfortable and stylish as it is functional. Surely the ideal for any space, and any home. k

Twitter: @reidfiona

• Offers over £415,000 to McEwan Fraser Legal (0131-253 2263, www.mcewanfraserlegal.co.uk). A closing date has been set for 11am on Wednesday. The Unique Home Company (www.theuniquehomecompany.com)