Designing The Hebrides on BBC2 is a series featuring Banjo Beale who was the winner of the reality show Interior Design Masters, hosted by Alan Carr, in 2022. This new series follows Banjo as he tries to establish his new design business in the Scottish Hebrides, where he lives with his husband Ro.
We follow the bubbly Australian as he tackles projects all over the islands, from a castle turret to a fish shop and everything in between. But, as we soon find out, taking on huge projects in such a remote place brings with it its own challenges – from the unpredictable weather to logistical nightmares.
“You’ve not got access to the usual stores and often people don’t deliver to the island or it’s extortionately expensive or it’s difficult to get to,” says Banjo. “I’m not a natural born planner and I didn’t have much time to pull these spaces off, so it was about being resourceful. But I think that’s the thing that islanders do the best. They are really resourceful. Also working for friends in a small town means the stakes are high. The locals are very straight talking and I didn’t want to mess it up and get run out of town.”
Here’s everything you need to know about BBC2 series Designing The Hebrides….
Designing The Hebrides release date
Designing The Hebrides is a six-part series that starts on BBC2 and BBCiPlayer from Wednesday April 12 at 8pm and runs weekly at the same time, taking us through spring 2023. We'll update if there are any international air dates.
Is there a trailer for Designing The Hebrides?
Yes there's now a Designing The Hebrides trailer released by the BBC which shows what Banjo will be getting up and where he visits in this beautiful part of north Scotland. Take a look below...
Banjo Beale on how Designing The Hebrides works
Designing The Hebrides follows Banjo Beale as he starts up his interior design business in the Scottish Hebrides.
“I think people probably think the locals here wouldn’t be interested in interior design but that couldn’t be further from the truth,” Banjo told us. “There are some challenges, so I don’t know if it’s a stupid idea or the best idea I’ve ever had.” With the entire populations of each tiny island he works on watching his progress, Banjo really must pull out all the stops to win their approval. “They are all fabulous characters and it’s their real life money they are putting in, so I had to get it right."
Designing The Hebrides episode guide
Here's our guide to eight episodes in Designing The Hebrides...
Episode 1: April 12 2023
Banjo is tasked with renovating his friend Sally’s fish shop in Tobermory on the Isle of Mull, which has been in her family since 1971. “It’s their livelihood and their legacy so I don’t want to mess it up,” says Banjo. But will his dream of covering both the interior and exterior with smoky black wood go down well with Sally and her parents?
Episode 2: April 19 2023
Banjo and his team must transform a tiny bothy on a remote island to make it ready for rent-paying guests but with the weather working against them, can they pull it off? “We did it up over two days in a hurricane on an island that was two hours walk to the nearest road, so we were trapped there,” recalls Banjo. We had to finish this in time in a tiny space, in two days in a storm, while living in the space with the camera crew. So, it was a recipe for disaster. We weren’t going to finish so I sent someone to walk back to call my husband and my friend to come and rescue us, so I was like a proper damsel in distress. My husband came on the back of a quad bike with a paint brush and my friend and saved the day, annoyingly. He told me it would be a nightmare to do but I ignored him and then I annoyingly had to ask him to come and help me finish it.”
Episode 3: April 26 2023
This time it’s a café and book shop in Skye that requires some TLC from Banjo. “That was crazy one. I spent all my money on a 4m high stained-glass window to use as a room divider. I used three quarters of the budget on it,” confesses Banjo.
Episode 4: May 4 2023
Banjo takes on a castle turret and a lighthouse that need redecorating. “It’s my neighbour’s castle. You can say that when you live in Scotland,” says Banjo. “She grew up in a really poor family and fell in love with the boy in the castle. After 40 years she got the golden ticket and moved into the castle, but she’s been running a B&B in there and getting up at 4am to tend to the cows and tourists, so finally we did this space for her and she can start enjoying her space a little bit for herself now. The lighthouse was only accessible by a tiny tin boat that only one person could fit in and I was transporting a Hungarian glass cabinet on the rocky Atlantic ocean, across the shore and then down a goat track. That’s when I thought ‘why am I doing this?’.”
Episode 5: May 11 2023
Banjo helps a local rugby club renovate their clubhouse so it can also be used as a wedding venue. “I had a bit of a journey going through doing that. I didn’t really want to do it,” confesses Banjo. “That was a hard one because it brought up a lot of stuff about when I was bullied in school and my relationship with straight, burly blokes. I had to come in as an interior designer and do up a rugby club and they also wanted it as a wedding venue, so I had to bring out their feminine side as well. That meant I had to come to the party and play rugby so it was a real personal journey.”
Episode 6: May 12 2023
Banjo and his husband Ro live on a cheese farm and in the final episode of the series they help the owner, their best friend Chris, build a gin bar on the premises. “I wasn’t allowed to buy a single thing new so everything was old and repurposed,” recalls Banjo. “I turned cow bells into light shades, I had cheese shelves that I turned into cladding, I used the local Co-op supermarket counters and clad them and used old church pews. I used everyone in town. I had grannies weaving chairs and it was a real team effort with the whole town coming together to do this space. We had a massive ceilidh at the end and a wild celebration, so that was really special.”
All about Designing the Hebrides star Banjo Beale
Australian Brendan ‘Banjo’ Beale moved to the Scottish Hebrides eight years ago, with his husband Ro. They began by travelling the world but ended up settling on a traditional dairy farm on the Isle of Mull. Banjo won Interior Design Masters in 2022 and hosts Scotland’s Home of the Year.
