WL Design 25 Winners 2026: Working It (Heritage Home Office)

It’s a delicate dance, renovating a heritage home: how do you respect history (and local bylaws) while also breathing fresh life into a space? But within constraint comes creativity, as designers Alison Connor and Alykhan Velji of Alykhan Velji Design discovered when City of Calgary parameters forced them to preserve an awkward entryway layout in a recent renovation. A small, unassuming room off the front hall would become “one of the most dynamic transformations we’ve ever undertaken,” writes Velji. The beautiful dual-purpose library and office became a space that instantly communicates the home’s character, complete with an auction-sourced vintage fireplace mantel that was painstakingly refurbished and reinstated as the room’s focal point. Connor and Velji also salvaged and restored beams and flooring from elsewhere in the house, bringing material continuity to the room, and created a cocooning effect by saturating the walls with bold, modern colour. A fresh look, but also one that “carries the story forward.”

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