The converted stable block of Sibyl Colefax designer Emma Burns

‘For the first three years of my life, I never stopped crying’, says Emma Burns. ‘My mother would push me down Kensington Church Street, and, for some relief, visit the local pawn shop where she would buy me the odd Royal Doulton plate or Worcester cup. She was determined that I should not eat off pieces covered in teddy bears’. Such early tuition in aesthetic discrimination has underpinned Emma's current role as one of the leading interior design directors at Sibyl Colefax & John Fowler, and is further illustrated in the rooms of The Dovecote, Emma's home in the country.

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Her parents first discovered the house 30 years ago when visiting a friend nearby. They had gone for a walk after lunch, during which they spotted an overgrown gate with neglected buildings beyond it. They made enquiries, and were told that these were the disused dovecote, stables and coach house belonging to the 'big house' next door - and that they were for sale, the owner having died recently at the age of 102. This was their longed-for project, and they decided there and then to take it on.

'My parents had very little spare money at the time', explains Emma, 'so, sensibly, they decided to put the roof in order first, and to establish the garden. Each Saturday, we three - and any friends we could coerce into helping dig up stones, dismantle old sheds, remove farm carts and generally restore some order - would descend on the place. Work was always followed by huge lunches cooked by my mother, and I don't remember many refusals.'

During summer holidays, the family camped in the barn; it took four years of hard work before they were able to move into the house itself. With the exception of the new staircase and bathroom, the layout of the two bedrooms upstairs remains much as it was when doves roosted there 100 years ago. Downstairs - on either side of the coach-house bay, which became the central hall - loose boxes were converted into kitchen and drawing room.

‘From the word go, this has been a house for wonderful parties and holidays’, says Emma. ‘When, after many years, my father died, we filled the barn with huge bunches of cow parsley, and held a party to celebrate both him and the house; it was really wonderful’. Some 12 years later, when her mother died, Emma inherited both The Dovecote and the determination to continue her parents' project.

‘During their lives, I proposed several changes, but it was only when the house became mine that I was able to put them into practice’, she explains. The original kitchen had an old pine island built around a structural post in the centre of the room. The post was removed and the beam it had supported was reinforced with a steel plate fixed to its underside with coach bolts that look 'relatively agricultural'. An Aga was installed, the lino floor was replaced with flagstones to match those in the hall, and reclaimed doors were found for the cupboards.

Emma stripped the ceilings to reveal beams, and installed cornicing and a new chimneypiece in the drawing room. She also raised the height of the doors from the entrance hall into both the kitchen and the drawing room. It was in replacing the original wooden coachhouse doors with two huge french windows, however, that the true transformation occurred: 'Instantly, the house seemed twice the size', remembers Emma.

The walls were painted in Farrow & Ball's 'Buff' and 'Chemise', and pieces from the antiques department at Sibyl Colefax & John Fowler were supplemented with those from other sources, such as The Lacquer Chest and Greenway Antiques. 'I have always believed that if you have beautiful things you should use them; if they are sometimes broken it shouldn't matter, because they have been enjoyed during their lifetime and not ignored', says Emma. She replaced her parents seating with large, soft sofas and armchairs, which invite guests to relax, and covered the floors in a patchwork of carpets. Many of the fabrics scattered throughout the house are now discontinued, but are loved like old friends by Emma: They have sort of mulched down into place, which is a very important process in any interior, she says.