Tours of the House
Entrance Hall
This was the only room to have been decorated when the house was completed, the rest of the house had to wait a number of years before they saw paint and wallpaper. The remarkable rococo plaster work was executed by a young man named George Morrison.
Morning Room
The Morning Room is a small private room detached from the public rooms, and known in the eighteenth century as the parlour, where the family would be able to make use of the light from the south-west facing windows for reading and sewing.
The Carousel Costume
In the former servery and butler's pantry, which still features an Edwardian dumb waiter, we also have on display a quite remarkable costume that Patrick Home, the original builder of Paxton House, worn during a spectacle at the court of Frederick the Great of Prussia in the early 1750s (for conservation reasons the costume is not currently on display, but we do have plans to redisplay it again in the future).
West Bedroom & Charter Room
At the time of the restoration of the West bedroom in 1991, some fragments of an early Victorian paper of crossed ribbons in buff and pale blue were discovered and the paper has been reproduced here.
The Charter Room now serves as an en-suite, but was built with a very different purpose in mind.
Alcove & Portico Bedrooms
The Alcove Bedroom, has been re-created according to the original plans, the room is so-called because the four poster bed sits within an alcove to protect it from draughts.
The Portico Room, a diminutive room dimly lit by one small window, looks out into the recess of the portico. The canopy rail of the four poster bed is delicately painted with roses and other flowers, a rarity of great interest to furniture historians. It is itemised in Chippendale's bill.
Principal Bedroom
This room boasts Paxton's finest Chippendale bedroom furniture. Particularly notable are the set of painted wheel back chairs, the intricate lady's writing table and the fine pair of mahogany chests of drawers with serpentine fronts.
Hall and Main Stair
The essentially domestic scale of Paxton is nowhere better illustrated than in the main staircase which connects the public rooms with the principal bedrooms. It is a pleasant space tucked in between the Entrance Hall and the Drawing Room.
Dining Room
The paintings in the Dining Room are trophies of Patrick's Grand Tours and were not in Paxton in Ninian Home's day. Many of the finest pieces of Paxton's Chippendale collection are in the Dining Room.
It was the dining room that provided the family with an opportunity to display its wealth and taste. The cutlery and plate, linens, porcelain and crockery all came under scrutiny when visitors were entertained, as did the quality of the wines and the excellence, or otherwise, of the various dishes. Ninian Home took care that the Paxton dining room should be the finest around. The room is a formal space in which the decoration of the walls and ceiling is beautifully balanced. The plasterwork ceiling pattern is characteristic of the Adam brothers manner at this period.
Drawing Room
The arrangement of the Drawing Room is typical of the neoclassical style favoured by John Adam's brothers, Robert and James.
This beautiful room is fresh and airy, flooded with light from three windows on the eastern side and two more, which overlook the River Tweed, at its southern end.
The slender panels of colour-printed trophies, which divide the walls, and the pretty arabesques with classical plaques above the doors, are a rare survival of an eighteenth century wallpaper, imported from France.
Bust Room & Library
When in 1795 Ninian Home died suddenly, Paxton House descended to his younger brother George, a lawyer in Edinburgh. In 1812, George also inherited the estate of Wedderburn Castle through Patrick Home.
George commissioned the Edinburgh architect Robert Reid in 1811 to design an additional east wing, containing a corridor (the bust Room), a library and a spectacular Picture Gallery. This work was carried out to house a number of books and paintings left to George by Patrick, and was executed in the Regency style of architecture with curved walls of elegant proportions.
The Library and Gallery were furnished by the cabinet makers William Trotter and Son, known for their extensive domestic commissions in Edinburgh's New Town and several public commissions such as Register House and Holyrood
Picture Gallery
The magnificent Picture Gallery is the grand culmination of the suite of rooms added by George Home.
Two features distinguish the gallery from other rooms in the house: its scale and the complexity of its plan. The room has only one window on the south wall and is lit principally by a large oval roof-light in the centre of the ceiling and a pair of lunette shaped lights set within the half domes of either apse.
The Picture Gallery now houses a collection of paintings on loan from the National Galleries of Scotland and features works by Raeburn, Reynolds, Wilkie, Nasmyth, Thomas Lawrence and others.