Originally built in the 1820s, the two Category A-listed town houses at 19 and 20 Coates Crescent had been used as offices for many years and had suffered from unsympathetic alterations and a general lack of love. Despite this they retained much of their late-Georgian grandeur, with a wealth of historic features and a prime location in Edinburgh's Western New Town. Our client acquired the properties with a view to restoring them to high-end homes as they were originally intended.

We stripped away the years of accretions, allowing the original spaces and proportions to be appreciated again, retaining period features including ornate cornices, doors and panelling, wrought-iron balustrades and top-lit stairs, and carefully divided off the basement levels to form two self-contained garden apartments below the restored townhouses.

New high-specification kitchens and bathrooms - in a traditional style at the client's request - were sensitively introduced within the original room layout along with carefully integrated modern services including energy-efficient heating, dedicated low-energy lighting circuits and CAT6 cabling throughout.

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The project required a suitably sensitive and respectful approach to the existing buildings to gain Listed Building Consent, including upgrading original panelled doors to provide the fire resistance required by modern building regulations, and careful detailing to achieve acoustic and fire separation between the townhouses and flats with minimal disruption to the historic fabric.

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Completed while at McLaren Murdoch & Hamilton

Photos © Rettie & Co and 83S Ltd

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