When actors Dichen Lachman and Maximilian Osinski first discovered their house in west London’s leafy Chiswick neighborhood, they were in the middle of a routine workout. The husband and wife, known for their respective standout roles in Apple TV+’s critically acclaimed Severance and the global hit Ted Lasso, were at a nearby gym when Lachman spotted an intriguing real estate listing for a property located just a four-minute walk away. "Oh, I will just go have a quick look—I will be right back," Lachman recalls thinking at the time, leaving her workout behind to investigate.
It was not love at first sight in the conventional sense. The three-bedroom Victorian property had barely been touched since the 1970s, and Osinski says it was "the complete opposite" of the colorful, joyful home it is today, bearing decades of outdated wear and tear. Yet, Lachman, who stars in the horror film Other Mommy, could immediately see past the neglect and recognize the property’s underlying potential. As chance would have it, the couple already happened to know architect and designer Charlotte Lilford, a parent at their daughter Mathilda’s school, who had previously renovated another period house further down the same street.
Keen to share her vision, Lachman took Osinski to tour Lilford’s completed local project for inspiration. He liked what he saw enough to make a major life decision without even viewing the interior of the house they were ultimately planning to buy. "I thought, If we could have something like this, I would be so happy," Osinski says. "I trusted the end result, and the footprint is the footprint."
The resulting architectural venture proved to be part meticulous renovation and part total reimagining. Lilford, a French mother of five who splits her professional life between London and Paris, extended both the loft space and the ground floor, completely reworked the 1,779-square-foot floor plan, and breathed vibrant new life into the structure’s period architecture. She carefully retained original Victorian details wherever possible while aggressively reinstating period features that had unfortunately been stripped away over decades of previous ownership. Lilford’s design philosophy is firmly architectural first—she focuses intently on understanding precisely how a modern family functions within a domestic space before deciding how it should ultimately look. "I like designing spaces that are practical," she explains. "I cannot design a space if it makes no sense in terms of the usage."
For Lachman and Osinski, who live in the Chiswick home alongside their young daughter and their beloved dog, Whisky, the interiors needed to accommodate a lifestyle that is far from static or predictable. Their permanent relocation across the Atlantic was initially intended to be entirely temporary. Osinski had landed the role of the flamboyant, larger-than-life footballer Zava in Ted Lasso, which required months of intensive filming in Richmond. Concurrently, Lachman was filming Severance, in which she plays the multifaceted roles of Gemma Scout and the enigmatic Ms. Casey. What began as a short-term, opportunistic move away from Los Angeles gradually morphed into a permanent relocation as the family fell deeply in love with the tight-knit, community-focused feel of west London.
The house reflects that transatlantic transition in every corner. Carefully curated pieces brought over from their former home in Los Angeles sit comfortably alongside objects carrying deep personal and family history. For instance, Lachman brought a treasured 19th-century tapestry that originally belonged to her Tibetan grandmother. Born in Kathmandu, Lachman lived in Nepal until she was seven years old before her family permanently immigrated to Adelaide, Australia. Those formative early years have remained an essential part of her lifelong connection to her unique heritage.
Similarly, Osinski’s personal collection of vintage Polish circus posters ties the home’s striking interiors back to his own family history. Handcrafted rugs created by Lachman’s grandfather, along with a variety of family mirrors and sentimental objects, were deliberately retained because they carried irreplaceable memories. "We have this funny little ritual," Lachman smiles, reflecting on their domestic traditions. "When we go to a new city or country, we always buy a Christmas decoration. I know it is very cheesy and touristy, but our tree is really eclectic now and carries beautiful memories. I think that is what makes a home." Osinski echoes this sentiment, noting, "Our style is not very cookie-cutter, and neither is Charlotte’s."
The interior design scheme throughout the house makes liberal use of color, bold wallpaper, natural marble, intricate mosaics, and Zellige tiling, though these elements are purposefully concentrated to create dramatic focal points. Upon entering the home through the hallway, terracotta-toned walls bring instant warmth to the cool terrazzo floor, while a bespoke mustard banquette doubles as clever built-in storage. Suspended directly above it, a vintage Danish brass Kastor pendant light originally designed by Jo Hammerborg for Fog & Mørup adds a striking sculptural note.
The stairwell was given special attention during the structural overhaul. "The first thing you see when you step into the house is the stairwell," explains Lilford. "So it had to make a statement. We took the old staircase out and played with the shape to create more space around it."
The heart of the home is undeniably the kitchen, which was built entirely by bespoke joinery company Julien Austin Giles and features a dramatic, heavily patterned marble counter. "I have clients that sometimes do not want a marble worktop because they are worried about staining, but it is also part of the aging process," Lilford explains. "Those natural materials give real character to your space." Osinski reflects on how the kitchen naturally functions as the primary social hub when guests are over: "When we have friends over, everyone goes to the kitchen. I have started to feel like if I suggest heading to the living room it is almost an insult," he laughs.
Lilford designed the kitchen to function as a hardworking, highly practical family environment while ensuring it felt like a seamless, beautiful extension of the formal living spaces rather than a purely utilitarian zone. "You need kitchens to be practical but pretty because everybody is entertaining in their kitchen," Lilford notes. When the couple relocated from Los Angeles, they brought an intimidating list of oversized appliances, including significantly larger-than-average ovens and a substantial range cooker uncommon in standard UK properties. However, Lilford ingeniously engineered a layout that comfortably accommodated these American-scale amenities within the more compact confines of a London Victorian footprint.
This balanced approach to scale and audacity extends outdoors to the compact courtyard garden, which is treated by the design team as an additional indoor room. "The smaller the garden, the more money you need to put in it," Lilford says. "You need to make a real splash." That visual splash is achieved through a striking green marble wave mosaic tile pattern from Starel—a triumph of an outdoor flooring feature that effortlessly flows from the exterior straight back inside the house. "When the space is relatively small, you can be a bit more extravagant because you do not need to buy as much material," Lachman observes. "If we had to tile an entire backyard in LA with that tile, we would never have done it."
If anything, the artistic couple—who first met while living in West Hollywood and have been happily married for over a decade—often had to be reigned in rather than encouraged when it came to making bold design choices. "Charlotte is really good at toning us down," Lachman admits. "We are good at pushing back in terms of going a bit darker or wilder." That creative negotiation is visibly demonstrated throughout the upper levels of the house. The upstairs movie theater, for instance, is completely wrapped in a fantastical Matières Végétales jungle wallpaper produced by French design house Élitis. "The Fifth Avenue Hotel in New York was a big inspiration in terms of really leaning into the wallpaper and the color," says Lachman. "I tried to track down some of their wallpaper actually, but it was custom."
Daughter Mathilda’s bedroom features an equally bold statement, utilizing a striking green Gucci Heron print covering the walls. Her adjoining bathroom features a custom peach basin set against Starry Night navy blue tiles by Otto Tiles, which remarkably continue right across the ceiling. "The dark tiles create a cosy, magical nighttime feeling. It was a small space, so we could go full on," Lilford explains.
For a family whose demanding professional schedules continue to take them to far-flung corners of the globe, the Chiswick house has firmly established itself as a steadfast emotional anchor. Lachman spent time on location in New Zealand earlier this year filming The Legend of Zelda, while Osinski has been working closer to home on the hit BBC comedy Ann Droid. Despite the global travel demanded by their careers, it is here in west London that their daily lives have firmly taken root.
During a recent visit to the property, a helpful neighbor was looking after the family dog, Whisky, while young Mathilda was out playing at a friend’s house down the street, illustrating how deeply integrated the actors have become in their local community. "LA is built for cars," Osinski reflects. "London is very human scale." While their Chiswick Victorian may possess a smaller footprint than the modern new-build home they left behind in Southern California, it has successfully fostered a much more connected, grounded way of living.
Practical enough for everyday family life, playful enough to genuinely reflect its artistic owners, and meticulously engineered to make every single square foot count, the house ultimately achieves what every renovation strives for: it feels deeply lived in, richly meaningful, and profoundly loved.
