Scotland’s Home of the Year 2023: Edinburgh railway station turned family home wins popular BBC property show

Winner of BBC show was selected from shortlist of six finalists from across Scotland

A Victorian renovation in Edinburgh which was once a train station has been named Scotland's Home of the Year for 2023.

Old Train House was crowned the winner of the annual BBC Scotland show during a half-hour-long finale screened on Monday evening (June 26).

The property, which in the Leith area of the city, is home to Christina and Ben Blundell, their daughter Vesper and Watson the dog. It was boarded up and laid empty for 10 years before the couple lovingly transformed it into a welcoming family home.

The Old Train House in Edinburgh was crowned the winner of Scotland's Home of the Year 2023 during the finale of the BBC Scotland show screened on Monday evening. Photos: BBC Scotland

Inside, Christina and Ben’s eclectic tastes can be seen as well as their desire to be sustainable with second hand furnishing adorning the three levels. In addition to extensive renovations, there are nods to the building’s past including graffiti on the exterior garden walls, giving Old Train House a unique style.

The SHOTY judges – interior designers Anna Campbell-Jones and Banjo Beale and architect and lecturer Michael Angus – crowned the winner of Scotland’s Home of the Year 2023 from a shortlist of six finalists from across Scotland. From Edinburgh to Aberdeenshire, Auchterarder to Peebles, the Isle of Skye to Glasgow, this year’s search showcased a variety of home styles including quirky conversions to grand designs self-build homes to period renovations, environmentally-friendly homes to bijou pads.

Homeowner Christina was delighted – albeit a tad surprised – when Old Train House won the coveted title. She said: “Winning was a genuine shock and we’re bursting with pride. Ben and I entered with no expectations other than going along for the ride – we did not anticipate in any way that we’d be taking the trophy home that day, particularly when we got to see all the other fabulous finalists homes.

“As the final was filmed last summer, the SHOTY trophy has been sadly tucked away while we’ve kept the secret of winning to ourselves. I think it’ll either go in the hallway or perhaps outside somewhere. All of the finalists are a lovely bunch and I couldn’t pick a favourite home among them. They each have an individual and special quality – I’m glad the judging wasn’t up to me.”

SHOTY judge and interior designer Anna Campbell Jones believes the Edinburgh home is a very worthy winner of the prestigious title. She said: “Old Train House expresses the ultimate in adaptation and reuse, themes that are so important these days – the whole building was upcycled, transformed from a sad ruined train station to a very real home.

“I loved the balance of respect for the history of the building, clever use of bargain vintage finds and appropriate materials both for the age of the building and for its function as warm, fun family home.

“I thought the upside-down living worked so well, keeping the light spaces for daytime (and nebbing!) and the darker quiet more private spaces for sleeping in, but the scene stealer was the old railway platform transformed into a magical plant filled, tree canopied terrace.”

Interior Designer Banjo Beale agreed: “This home has been a journey for its owners, from abandoned train station to beloved home. You could feel the love that had been poured into this building. Old Train House feels like a sanctuary in the city, full of plants, light and life.

“It’s hard to pick one thing about Old Train House which made it unique because it had that elusive, hard to define and harder to create feeling of home. I felt right at home in the platform bedroom, a moody, inky blue cocoon.

“From grand manse’s to quirky cottages, the homes we visited this series were as colourful as the characters that made them. That’s what makes SHOTY great – the people that make these homes.”

Architect and lecturer Michael Angus added: “It was that indefinable thing, that lifted the Old Train up above the rest. Some curious blend of components, of building, fabric, place, time, that come together somehow, to imbue a home with a certain overall quality that is truly, home.

“The echoes of its previous service so pervaded, the many brief ghosts that once passed through doubtless would linger comfortably in a place transformed. The building too, might have been threatened by a similar fate: redundancy, had vision and ambition for some extended future not taken root here.”

Scotland’s Home Of The Year, the full seven-part fifth series for BBC Scotland, is available to view on BBC iPlayer.