Kirstie Allsopp’s property makeover show has been slated by the critics, but she still gets the viewer’s vote, writes Gabrielle Fagan After some recent scathing reviews of her new show, Kirstie Allsopp needs to have a sense of humour. And to prove it, the property guru points to a picture frame in her London home. It displays a newspaper cutting of a review written at the start of her television career which states: “Kirstie fails to achieve two qualities needed for a TV presenter — being able to walk and talk at the same time.”

Kirstie roars with laughter as she shows it to me, obviously content that, over the years, she has proved the writer wrong.

But you sense that the popular co-presenter of Location Location Location and Relocation Relocation also fervently hopes that she will once again defy the critics who have lambasted her latest Channel Four programme, Kirstie’s Homemade Home.

In it, Kirstie renovates her Devon holiday cottage, scouring second-hand shops and reclamation yards for bargains and taking up 15 craft skills, including making her own wallpaper and stained glass.

Various critics described the series as “patronising”, called her posh and “bossy”, and pointed out that it was all very well for her to tell people how to save money and economise in a recession when she is the worry-free partner of a multi-millionaire property developer.

Kirsty said: “I have been gobsmacked at the really harsh stuff that has been said. People who regard themselves as the clever, chattering classes have been damning about the programme and had a real go.”

Warned about some hostile press, she prudently gathered her two sisters together and they sat on either side of her as she digested the good and the bad.

“We laughed at the terrible ones and figured that critics aren't paid to be nice. I have been slightly knocked back by it, but I am not upset because I have a buffer — like a bullet-proof vest — of the amazing public reaction to the show. It has been so positive you wouldn't believe! I am hoping for a second series.” She also points out that the viewing figures were “staggering”, and web comments have been “Ninety-five per cent positive, which is unheard of.”

Her longtime co-presenter Phil Spencer has been hugely supportive, she added.

“He always makes this gesture of waving his hand over his head and saying, ‘Let it all go over your head’,” Kirstie said. “He urged me not to take negatives to heart as you can’t please all the people all of the time.”

None of the barbs have dulled her delight in the transformation of her tumbledown five-bedroom house on the North Devon coast, which she masterminded during a break from TV after the birth of her second son, Oscar, now eight months, and brother to Bay, two.

The property was bought by her partner Ben Andersen at auction for £300,000 a year ago, and the couple spent around £100,000, mainly onstructural work.

“We have a lovely house in Devon already but Ben knew I had always wanted a beach house,”

Kirstie says. “But what a task to do it up! It had not been lived in for 37 years and it was damp, rotting and so overgrown you could hardly see it.

It needed rewiring, replumbing, a new roof, replastering, windows replacing.”

Renovation was so costly that she was left with only £15,000 for decorating, furnishing and touches to turn it into a holiday home.

This wasn't a problem because Kirstie fervently believes in a ‘make do and mend’ approach to life, and never having something new where something old will suffice.

It is, she points out, part of her heritage. She is the daughter of Charles Allsopp, a former chairman of auctioneer Christie’s, and inherited her interiors 'eye' from her mother Fiona McGowan, an interior designer.

“I really have a passion for antiques, refurbishing, renovating, and love finding things in skips or reclamation yards and giving them new life,” Kirstie said.

“I think that is why I felt a bit sensitive about the criticism for the show, because I was showing what I do in my personal life and talking about things which I am genuinely enthusiastic about.”

And Ben, whose parents run an antique shop, has the same belief, she says, despite his wealth.

“Ben is very successful — he left school at 16 and set up his own business. He is an extraordinary person,” she said.

“Both he and I are very, very conscious that you don't buy new. We don’t buy new furniture and he even sometimes buys second-hand toys for the kids."”

She cites the occasion on one of their many trips to the house from London that he spotted a secondhand cabin bed advertised for sale on the roadside. He bought it and loaded it on the car roof, despite the fact its heavy load slowed down their journey.

“It was a real bargain, £20 instead of £500 plus, he's always on the lookout for things like that.”

Kirstie believes her bargain-hunting tips could be hugely useful in our cash-strapped times.

“You can brighten up your house for not a lot.

Of course, I know not everyone has the time to take up crafts and make things themselves,” she said. “I am just pointing out that if you can, it gives you a huge degree of satisfaction and gives a home character.

“But you can also save a shed-load of money like I did by not being too proud to lug things out of skips or jazz up things that you find on the side of the road, mend broken furniture, go to auctions and generally find a new use for everything.”

She describes the home’s style as ‘British, rustic’ and ‘family-friendly’, with the inevitable Aga in the kitchen. It is in a secluded setting tucked into the side of a hill, by a rocky cove.

Kirstie says: “I love the kitchen so much I am going to replicate it in our London home.

“The wooden floor is made of timber reclaimed from a school gym, and I also managed to raid the science lab and used the wooden counters from there as worktops.

“I love the glossy white units by Magnet kitchens, and the table was a workbench at my brother’s art gallery. We sawed a bit off it and put some legs on it.”

The 35-year-old learned knitting, spinning, quilt-making, sewing, pottery, candle-making, upholstery, how to make lampshades and even glass-blowing.

There was, though, one makeover mistake: “I painted a mirror from a skip a fabulous pink, but when I hung it I discovered it made everyone look short and fat! I will definitely recycle that.”