Edinburgh New Town resident ordered to repaint pink door receives complaint over new colour

Miranda Dickson says she feels persecuted after a third consecutive complaint was made.

A resident of Edinburgh’s New Town who was ordered to repaint her pink front door or face a £20,000 fine is facing a fresh complaint over her new colour choice.

Miranda Dickson, of Drummond Place, said she used an “off white” to paint her door, which was changed from bright pink to green after the original complaint was made in October last year.

Ms Dickson, who has returned to Edinburgh from Los Angeles after inheriting the home of her parents, said she was starting to feel targeted over the issue. Her home sits in the New Town conservation area and UNESCO World Heritage area, with guidance outlining front doors should be painted in “dark or muted” tones.

Members of the public walk past a New Town house where the homeowner is facing a council investigation into the colour of the front door. Picture: Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images

Interior designer Anna Campbell-Jones, a judge on Scotland’s Home of the Year, said Edinburgh City Council should “update” its guidance on Georgian colours given the broad palette in use at the time.

Ms Dickson, a mother-of-two, learned about the latest complaint through a journalist. She said the attitudes in Edinburgh were the polar opposite of LA or the neighbourliness of Moss Side in Manchester.

She said: "I was just gobsmacked. I wouldn't have known about the complaint, the council haven't reached out to me about it. Somebody is complaining that I painted the door back to its original colour, which is categorically not true.

"I feel like it's becoming discriminatory, it obviously is personal. There are many brightly coloured doors within Edinburgh's New Town.”

The "off-white" used to paint the front door in Drummond Place in Edinburgh's New Town. PIC: Contributed.

Ms Dickson said the council told her there was no colour palette of permitted colours to refer to.

She said: “They just said a 'normal colour'. I don't know when these rules were made, but when I stripped the door it had been bright yellow and mint green."

Ms Dickson inherited the house in 2019 with the door painted pink in 2021. She was told to change it in October last year or face a £20,000 fine.

In April, she painted it green and received a letter the following month saying she was "violating" the UNESCO heritage area. It was painted “off-white” three weeks ago.

Miranda Dickson's pink front door, before it was recently painted. Picture: Miranda Dickson/SWNS

Ms Campbell-Jones, in an interview on BBC's Good Morning Scotland, said: “Maybe there should be a bit of an update about what colours are actually Georgian. If you look at the interiors of Robert Adam, it is like a My Little Pony rainbow palette.

"Georgians loved bright pinks, aqua marines, arsenic greens and while they may not have used them on the front doors at the exact time that those buildings were being built, they were using them around that time.

“I was thinking about Dublin and the incredible colours of the Georgian front doors and how that in itself is a tourist attraction. The idea that heritage means muted is wrong. I think that is more of a Victorian thing.

“If the guidelines were clearer, broader, people wouldn't be in this situation where they are having to paint their doors several times.”

A spokesman for the City of Edinburgh Council said: "We have received a complaint alleging that the door has been repainted pink. We're currently looking into this and so can't say more at this time."