Shabby-chic debate: the £3.5m Colebrooke Row townhouse that split Country Life

# What the house is and why it matters 61 Colebrooke Row is a four-storey Georgian townhouse in one of Islington's well-regarded streets, offered at £3.5 million. It sits in a conservation area and has been refurbished in a way that intentionally leaves visible wear and signs of previous life: cracked plaster, marks on walls and a patinated finish rather than a fully restored, pristine interior.

# The debate inside Country Life The house prompted a strong divide among Country Life staff. One group responded positively to the aesthetic, describing it as beautiful and characterful. The other group found the look too shabby, uncomfortable with an appearance that reads as unfinished or neglected despite recent works. The article frames the disagreement as a broader question about where tasteful preservation ends and neglect begins.

# The restoration precedent: St Giles House The piece references Nick Ashley-Cooper, the 12th Earl of Shaftesbury, and his approach to restoring the family seat, St Giles House in Wimborne St Giles, Dorset. After inheriting the estate at a young age — following tragic family events noted in the text — he led a restoration that deliberately kept signs of age: portraits hung on walls where plaster had fallen away, traces of old fittings left visible, and large chandeliers reduced to their remaining wires.

That project received significant recognition, winning the Georgian Group Award, the HHA/Sothebys Award and the RICS National Building Construction Award. Country Life argues that this restoration helped popularise keeping marks and cracks as part of a house's character during refurbishment work.

# Row fits the trend The townhouse on Colebrooke Row is described as a London instance of the same aesthetic trend that the Earl's St Giles restoration championed: refurbish, update utilities and structure, but leave visible evidence of a building's past rather than erasing it. The article suggests this approach has become common in period homes and gives the Manhattan home mentioned as a more extreme example, with 61 Colebrooke Row running close to that level of deliberate roughness.

# What to look for if you're considering a similar home

• Check what structural and service work has actually been completed versus what remains cosmetic. Visible cracks and marks can be intentional, but they might also hide unfinished important repairs.
• Confirm listing detail and planning context: conservation-area status can limit future alterations and affect permission for visible changes.
• Ask for specifics about the refurbishment contract: what was retained intentionally, and what remains to be finished.

# Bottom line 61 Colebrooke Row is priced and positioned as a fashionable, consciously-aged townhouse. Whether it reads as charmingly characterful or too unfinished depends on personal taste and on practical due diligence about what work is complete and what is deliberate aesthetic.