A Victorian mansion in the Scottish Highlands has just had one of the most thoughtful interior overhauls you'll see this year — and it starts with the walls themselves.
Glencoe House, built in 1896-97 as a home for Canadian railway magnate Donald Alexander Smith (later Lord Strathcona), was famously conceived as a grand romantic gesture to his wife, Isabella. The couple's initials are still worked into the architecture. Today the property operates as one of Scotland's most distinguished luxury hotels, and a recent refurbishment has refreshed its public rooms and suites without scrubbing away that history.
Edinburgh studio Malcolm Duffin Design, which specialises in restoring historic properties, led the scheme, partnering with Welsh wallcovering maker Newmor. The centrepiece is a bespoke scenic mural for the reception, grand hall and staircase: layered trees and foliage in deep blues and greens that sweep up around the timber staircase and frame the double-height windows. Because the design was digitally printed, it could be tailored precisely to the stairwell's proportions, running continuously from reception to the upper level. A faux stone-block wallcovering also frames the reception bay window, adding geometric detail that doesn't fight the original joinery.
Beyond the one-off pieces, the team pulled from Newmor's existing ranges: a large-scale Morris damask in Sage and Bluebell, plus custom colourways matched to individual suites, Herringbone for the connecting spaces, deeply embossed Hessian for woven texture, and Tussah, which mimics raw silk with a faint metallic sheen. The brief throughout was to echo the dramatic Glencoe landscape — textures, organic patterns, a Highland palette — while keeping the rooms firmly of the present.
For travellers, the design story is really a signal of intent. Glencoe House isn't a generic luxury bolt-hole; it's a property that leans into its Victorian romance and its setting at the foot of one of Scotland's most famous glens. If you're the kind of guest who books hotels partly for their sense of place, the new interiors are engineered to deliver exactly that — moody Highland colours, trees climbing the stairwell, windows framing the scenery they were inspired by. It also works as a stop on a wider Highlands itinerary: Glencoe itself is a must for hikers and photographers, Fort William and Ben Nevis sit within easy reach, and the property suits couples, walkers and anyone after a quiet, design-conscious base between Fort William and Oban.
The bigger takeaway for design-minded visitors: the best Highland hotels right now aren't importing a generic luxury look — they're commissioning work rooted in the terrain outside the window. Glencoe House is a good example of how that's done.