At home with Dixie Mirowski from Catalog Interiors

At home with is back, and this time we’re heading to beautiful Edinburgh for a virtual tour of the newly renovated Victorian semi of Catalog Interiors co-founder, Dixie Mirowski and her partner, product designer Ralf Farthing.

Running their independent design store in nearby Stockbridge, while living with their daughter in the leafy suburb of Trinity since 2019, when the flat upstairs to their own went on the market the chance to return the original house back into a two-storey home was too good an opportunity for the couple to miss.

And, now thanks to the help of local architecture studio Pend, the inspirational space they’ve created has not only become the perfect personal sanctuary, but also a place to showcase all their incredible Nordic design pieces too.

Over to Dixie to tell us more:

“We are always on the lookout for a project, but this was certainly our biggest challenge to date. Having worked with Jamie Anderson, Pend’s amazing Director, on past commercial projects, we’d already approached him to design a single-story extension on our existing property when our neighbour upstairs decided to sell.

With a once in a lifetime chance to create our ideal family home, without the usual set of compromises, safe to say everything changed in an instant. Maximising the space and light was what we desired most, and the reimagined layout we ended up with is now both practical for our day-to-day family life, as well as perfect for entertaining.

Firstly, the bathrooms and bedrooms went upstairs, before the hallway was opened up and the kitchen was moved to the front of the house. Yet, for me, it’s the main living area that’s my favourite. With the sliding doors overlooking the patio and garden, and the timber slatted wall, I just find it so calming to be in, and we get beautiful afternoon and evening light in this space too.

Our style is about combining old pieces with new, contemporary with antiques or heirlooms. And, while I love all things Scandinavian, I also love a colonial interior, as my mother grew up in Sri Lanka, India and Africa, and I think this has really influenced my taste.

Even though we’ve still the hall, stairs and landing to complete, a fantastic metal fabricator in East Lothian is currently making the handrail, this house already feels like home. Here we can be our true selves, whether that’s just us with Bagheera our cat, with our wider family or with our friends; we feel very lucky indeed.”