Art, interior design and glorious gardens are a passion at this lush expanse of Fife countryside, home to the Earls of Crawford since 1580
Should you be walking your dog in the woods of the Balcarres Estate in East Fife, you may well see a man busy with a buzzing power tool. It could be the full-time forester who looks after the spectacular trees. Or it could be the 30th Earl of Crawford who, aged 66, still puts in a regular shift. “Dad likes to get out with the chainsaw once a week,” smiles his son, Lord Alexander Balniel. “Looking after the woods is a whole family activity.”
The estate’s 5,000 acres of arable land, pasture and trees, plus a golf course that looks out over Largo Bay and the Forth, are a family business – that is, a business run by a family who have lived here since 1580 and have one of the country’s most ancient titles. Three generations of the Lindsays – that’s their clan name – currently live in Balcarres House. This A-listed mansion, built by the second son of the ninth earl, became the family seat in the 16th century. It had a 19th-century glow-up and is now home to the earl and his wife, plus Alexander, his American wife Alli and their two little boys.
Alexander, the oldest of four siblings and the heir to the title, did not have this on his bingo card when he left St Andrews Uni versity, or at least not until he was considerably older. But lock down brought him and Alli back to Scotland and fast forwarded his role in the estate’s future. After a few months in the big house, the couple looked around for a separate property to make their own home. They alighted on the East Lodge, a white washed cottage with a mature garden. The renovations began.
Alexander’s godfather Tom Parr, a senior figure at wallpaper house Colefax & Fowler, had decorated many of the rooms in the main house and Alexander grew up surrounded by rich pattern and colour – and art. His Swiss grandmother had twin passions: gardening and 20th-century European painting and sculpture. While her family’s collection of Giacomettis is now in the Kunsthaus in Zurich, Alexander has inherited her eye for a herbaceous border and a striking composition.
So when he was unleashed on the cottage, he confidently created a home that is at once cosy and unexpected, with saturated tones and bold fabrics. There’s a copper tub in the bedroom and art everywhere. No sooner were the last plates hung on the walls (decorative dishes are a weakness of his) than Alli won a place at Harvard Business School.
The obvious thing to do was to let out the cottage while they were in Boston. And by that circuitous route, Balcarres Estate entered the holiday rental market. It made sense. Its golf course, Dumbarnie Links, was already winning awards and becoming a must-play for discerning golfers. Why not offer them somewhere to stay right next door?
Home from the US, Alexander and Alli now have two boys. The East Lodge is too small for boisterous children, so they’re back in the main house. That’s not the only area of expansion. There are now four more holiday lets, including the five-bed West Muircambus Farmhouse, Alexander’s most ambitious renovation to date. There’s a clear line between the East Lodge and the new property, showing his growing confidence and style. “Each generation at Balcarres finds its passion,” he explains. “For my father, it’s forestry and farming. For Alli and me, it’s art, interiors, gardens.”
A corner of the living room in West Muircambus illustrates this perfectly. There’s an Eames lounger and footstool in front of classic Colefax & Fowler curtains. An Alexander Calder mobile is just visible in the background. “I always wanted to create traditional British interiors that felt different, done to a high standard but with a modern twist.”
Alexander’s transition from working for Reuters in London to choosing cushions was not always an easy one. For the first properties, when he was struggling with scale and lighting, he enlisted the help of a young New York designer, Amelia Elliman. “She encouraged me to be brave,” he smiles. Her advice has more than paid off. But lush as the interiors are, it would be criminal to come to Balcarres and stay inside.
Behind the gates is a magical, secluded mixture of woods, meadows and farmland. A grand folly peeps out from behind the trees. There’s an old sawmill and extensive farm outbuildings. Horses, another of the family’s passions, look very much at home here. Alexander’s mother loves to ride and one of his sisters is a champion eventer. He and his brother play polo. Guests can explore the estate and nearby beaches on horse back. You can even bring your own horse with you on holiday.
The Lindsays take conservation seriously, although they are uncomfortable shouting about it. There are 40 beehives and a plan to encourage the red squirrel population. Pheasants wander around the grounds as if they, and not the clan Lindsay, own the place.
Across the estate there are 12 farms with sheep and beef cattle, operating to the highest sustainability standards. Alexander switches from discussing Peter Doig, one of his favourite artists, to the benefits of mob grazing, a grass-friendly way to raise livestock, without pausing for breath.
Balcarres House and the formal gardens that surround it are private. But, although those gates are closed, it’s the family’s values and passions that make the estate such a special place. “Less than 8% of our properties are holiday lets,” Alexander stresses. “People work here, farming is going on. It’s not a resort, it’s a real place.”
Balcarres Estate
Colinsburgh
Fife
KY9 1HJ
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