Seton House Castle is built on the site of the Palace of Seton which was demolished in 1790 after 75 years of neglect.  The Palace was often regarded as the most desirable Scottish residence of the 16th and 17th centuries and was frequently visited by royalty including Mary Queen of Scots, James VI and Charles I.  The castle is a Grade A Listed Castellated late Georgian House Designed by Robert Adam. 

Hall, drawing room, dining room, morning room, sitting room, various halls and lobbies, 2 kitchens, 10 principal bedrooms and 5 bathrooms.  Turret rooms and barrel vaulted reception room.  Adjoining east and west wing cottages with workshop, stabling, storage and garaging.  Extensive gardens and grounds.  About 13.50 acres (5.46 Ha)

Seton House is situated in rural East Lothian, surrounded by fertile arable farmland and just 2 miles from the coast of the Firth of Forth.  Seton House benefits from excellent access but retains a peaceful and private setting amongst mature gardens and grounds.  From the upper floors and the roof, there are superb views over the Firth of Forth and Fife to the north and towards the Lammermuir Hills to the south.  Longniddry (1 mile) and Haddington (5 miles) provide most daily needs including primary and secondary schooling.  Edinburgh city centre is 12 miles away and provides the wide range of services and facilities as would be expected of the capital city of Scotland.  These include excellent private day and boarding schools and a renowned and distinguished university.  Edinburgh Airport (22 miles) offers regular daily flights to London and a number of European destinations.  At Edinburgh and Dunbar, there are railway stations for the east coast mainline to London.

The surrounding countryside provides a wealth of activities.  The theme of golf dominates the locality.  The 2002 Open Championship venue of Muirfield is within a few miles.  Further links courses of great renown include Aberlady, Gullane, Luffness and North Berwick.  In addition to golf, there is a wealth of game shooting available to rent on nearby estates, sailing in the Firth of Forth and walking in the Lammermuirs. 

Seton Castle, near Longniddry in East Lothian, was profiled more than two years ago when it was being sold by the Earl of Wemyss for offers above £750,000. The Robert Adam property, set in 13½ acres, was for much of its history, tenanted. As a result it was in quite a dilapidated state when Mary McMillan bought it for £1.25 million in December 2002. All she had to do was use the same interior decorator as the Queen.

Seton Castle is an exquisite example of Adam’s fascination with castle designs, but it had fallen into disrepair and experts had placed the cost of restoration at well in excess of £1 million. Enter Malcolm Duffin. The former head of design at the 200-year-old company Whytock & Reid had created fabric and furnishings for pop stars and the Royal Family — check out what he has done with the downstairs loo at Buckingham Palace next time you are there — and was now in charge of design at the Edinburgh firm Zebrano. He leapt at the opportunity to restore the castle to its former glory.

“A Robert Adam house sets an immediate tone for the scale of the project,” he says. “The highest priority was not to reinvent the wheel but to come up with a design that gave respect to the original architect.” That meant late nights of research and intense study of the Robert Adam archive, rediscovering the dazzling colours and delicate ornaments that Adam liked to employ.

“The design was quite easy,” he says. “We simply stripped the place back to its bare walls and rebuilt, replumbed, rewired it all. Put in central heating, a new kitchen, restored the stonework and designed and rebuilt the extensive parkland.” Easy for him, perhaps.