I've spent my career at the intersection of craft and systems—mapping textile repeats, decoding the math of yarn on early DOS-based CAD, architecting PLM environments, and later the archives that dated to the pre-Napoleonic era. So when I came across textile designer Lucy Bathurst's studio for Nest Design, I stopped scrolling.

This isn't just a beautiful workspace. It's a thesis on how heritage and making can coexist.

In 2019, Bathurst purchased a former London City Mission hall in Leytonstone, built in 1885. The building had lived many lives—possibly a cinema, a clothes storage facility, and most recently a space shared by several religious groups. It wore the scars: a clunky first-floor office, a crude partition wall slicing a window in half, blocked-up openings, and missing dormer windows.

"I saw this place on an estate agent's website on a Friday afternoon and thought, You're the one," Bathurst told House & Garden.

She brought in architect James Stevens, a former colleague from Retrouvius (the design studio known for its intelligent use of salvaged materials). His guiding question: How can a place be made more like itself?

Stevens carved out a first floor sitting just above the ground-floor window line, creating an enchanting sewing workroom for Bathurst's team. He preserved one double-height space—complete with a Douglas fir staircase that hangs down almost defying belief—which the team nicknamed "Dumbledore's office."

The rose window, long blocked up, was recreated and hoisted into place. Bathurst describes that moment as "almost biblical." Three dormer windows were reinstated based on a 1909 photograph. The pigment-tinted raw plaster walls and self-levelling screed floors kept the budget grounded while honouring the building's Victorian bones.

Every intervention was done with reverence for the original fabric. "It was a question of how we could respect the character of the building in a way that felt kind," Bathurst explains, "as well as answering the need for a design studio."

What strikes me most is the parallel between Bathurst's renovation philosophy and her textile practice. Nest Design creates bespoke soft furnishings—curtains, wall hangings, four-poster beds—by combining hand-dyed linens with antique fragments. The studio itself does the same: contemporary Douglas fir rising within 19th-century structure, modern making happening inside heritage walls.

There's a hidden bath beneath an iroko panel in her office. A working disco ball hangs above it. "James designed it and everything he does works," Bathurst says.

She's right. The whole building works. And for those of us who understand that the "magic" of product must remain scalable, visible, and commercially undeniable—even as we move into an AI-led landscape—this studio is a reminder that the container shapes the craft.

The thread of the human story, preserved.

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Nest Design: nestdesign.co.uk James Stevens / Bard: bard-scotland.com

Source: House & Garden, November 2025. Photography by Ben Anders.

Nest Design, led by Lucy Bathurst, has completed several high-profile textile projects blending bespoke craftsmanship with unique client visions. Key Commissions Projects include silk curtains for an Indian palace, furnishings for a gypsy caravan, and custom pieces for musicians such as The Beatles and The Rolling Stones. Bathurst also crafted layered linen voile curtains for translucency and patchwork designs using hand-dyed fabrics for modernist interiors. Architectural Collaborations The studio serves architects, hotels, and restaurants with soft furnishings like four-poster beds, headboards, and wall hangings made from vintage linens and natural silks. These works often feature in luxury settings, emphasizing texture and character from the Leytonstone mission hall studio.