Flats 1-6 Redheugh House including balustraded wall with gatepier, Kilbirnie, Kilbirnie, North Ayrshire

Description

Redheugh House is a large, multi-phase, irregular L-plan, two-storey and attic, Scots Baronial style house that sits on high ground to the north of the village of Kilbirnie. It was designed by the architects Clarke and Bell around 1880, with a dated 1890 addition to the north, and further dated 1905 additions to the west and north by John Snodgrass. It was subdivided into six apartments around 2000. It is built in coursed sandstone with a base course, first floor string course enclosing downpipes and an eaves course. There are crenulated architraves to some windows and wallheads, crowstepped gables and some of the corners have a corbelled turret detail at the first floor.

The entrance elevation to the east is eight bays and asymmetrical. It has an advanced off-centre canted entrance bay with a corbelled and crowstepped wallhead gable and a central stack. The entrance door has a segmental arched surround with a stone panel above with the initials 'G K'. The slightly lower four-bay section to the right has varied details including a small crowstepped wallhead gable, a rounded bay with a conical turret and two first floor windows breaking the eaves with different shaped stone pediments and decorative label stops.

The south (garden) elevation comprises an 1890 four-bay section to the right with crowstepped gables and an advanced two-bay section to the left, with a 1905 date stone in the west gable. The 1890 part has paired crenulated wallhead gables with a two-storey canted bay on the left gable. The 1905 part has a corbelled and crenulated parapet, rounded corners and a corbelled turret at the first floor west corner.

The elevations to the north and west are plainer. The stonework evidences where some later 20th century additions have been removed and the stonework reinstated around 2000. There are various window patterns with the larger ground floor windows predominantly tri-partite with crenulated details over the lintels. There is a single storey gabled addition to the north elevation which appears to date to the 1905 additions.

Part of the ground floor interior was seen in 2017 including two former principal rooms, the entrance hall and staircase. The entrance hall and stair has timber geometric panelling to dado height and decoratively carved and slender timber columns supporting plaster arches with a foliate and egg and dart cornice. Two of the columns are integral with the timber turned stair bannisters. There are some small painted glass panes in the upper part of the hall windows.

A room at the southwest corner (1905) has geometric timber dado panelling and a parquet floor. The room is divided by a pair of decoratively carved timber columns supporting a shallow arch, which is flanked by smaller arches with columnettes to the sides and low timber fretwork screens. The part of the room behind this is raised on a dais and has an imposing sandstone fireplace with a full height triangulated stone overmantle. There are full height glass doors leading to the south lawn. An adjoining room in the earlier part of the house has a decorative cornice and a marble mantlepiece with an arched firebox with a tiled insert.

The windows are predominantly plate glazing in timber sash and case frames. The entrance doors are timber panelled. There are grey slate roofs with crowstepped stone skews and decorative skewputts. The turret roofs have decorative slate patterns.

Attached to the entrance (east) elevation of the house is a stepped wall with a round headed arrowslit opening and balustrade. This wall terminates in a large round domed capped gatepier. The paired gatepier and wall has been demolished. The surviving easternmost single gatepier currently sits in the garden ground of 1 Redheugh Court (2017) and is excluded from the listing.

In accordance with Section 1 (4A) of the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) (Scotland) Act 1997 the following are excluded from the listing: 1, 2 and 3 Redheugh Court and the gatepier to the southwest.

Statement of Interest

Redheugh House is a large, multi-phase 19th century house with a wealth of good Scots Baronial style detailing and design elements on its exterior. It was designed by the architectural practice, Clarke and Bell with large early 20th century additions in a similar style, by local architect John Snodgrass. The house has been converted to six apartments, but in the areas which have been seen retains some decorative timber and plasterwork. The house has a local association with a prominent industrialist, whose family's thread manufacturing company, W & J Knox Ltd, were the main employer in the town of Kilbirnie.

Age and Rarity

On the 1st Edition Ordnance Survey map (surveyed 1856, published 1858) "Redheugh" is marked as a small farm to the north of the village of Kilbirnie. The building on the site is shown as a long rectangular plan range, similar to neighbouring farms. It is in the same position as the current building known as 1, 2 and 3 Redheugh Court. Redheugh House itself is not on this map.

The Dictionary of Scottish Architects notes that Redheugh House was designed by the architects, Clarke and Bell, around 1880. It records that they also added additions in 1890. Although the extent of these additions is not known, the east elevation of the house is two different heights with the four-bay section to the right (north) slightly lower and with different design details. It is possible that the southeastern corner of the house was built first as a smaller roughly square-plan house and then enlarged in 1890, as evidenced by the date stone in the north gable. The exterior wall junction between the double height stair window and the adjacent wall at the rear of the house also support these different build dates. There is also an undated carved panel over the entrance door with the decoratively carved initials 'GK; which appears to be older than the 1890 date stone.

Redheugh House is first shown on the 2nd Edition Ordnance Survey Map (surveyed 1895, published 1897) as a large roughly L-plan building immediately to the west of the small rectangular plan former farm building evident on the 1st Edition map. A walled garden is shown to the northwest of the house. A further rectangular enclosure is shown to the immediate north of the house and this may have been a kitchen garden. Redheugh House lies to the northern edge of the mill town of Kilbirnie, The west boundary of the property is the river Garnock which powered the town's manufacturing mills.

By the 3rd Edition Ordnance Survey map (surveyed 1908, published 1911) the footprint of the house has been extended by the two storey square plan addition at the southwest corner and the smaller single storey addition on the north gable. This map also shows a new entrance lodge and quadrant gateway to the south of the main house providing a new entrance from the south. This entrance lodge and gateway is listed at category B (LB7503). The map shows a new driveway and garden paths through what is shown as a more extensively planted garden.

Redheugh House was one of three large houses built to the north of the town for the Knox family. W and J Knox Ltd were a nationally renowned thread and fishing net manufacturing company that has a longstanding association with Kilbirnie. The firm had its origins in the later 18th century and by the late 19th century it was running three mills in Kilbirnie with subsidiary companies in the USA and Canada. The company was the main employer in the town as well as making other investments, such as funding the Knox Institute, a library and public building which was built in 1892 (listed at category B, LB7496).

In 1860 William Knox's son built Moorpark House (now a hotel) and by 1895 James Knox's elder son James had commissioned Place House (demolished in the 1990s following a fire). His younger son Bryce Muir Knox lived in Redheugh.

The exact date Bryce Muir Knox moved to Redheugh is unclear as different sources give contrasting dates. An 1898 newspaper article records that he was resident in Redheugh by 1898 but the company history notes state he moved there in 1901. The initials of Knox and his wife Agnes Dunlop (daughter of William Barr, a leather manufacturer in the neighbouring town of Beith) are included in the 1890 date stone on the north gable. In 1871 a newspaper had recorded that before his marriage Mr Bryce Muir Knox was living at Riverside House in Kilbirnie.

In 1905 Robert Snodgrass designed additions to Redheugh House for Bryce Muir Knox. The largest was the two storey square-plan addition to the southwest corner. The single storey crowstepped "cottage" attached to the north elevation is also thought to date to the 1905 work.

In the 1970s Redheugh was no longer in private ownership and was used as a residential hostel for boys. In around 2000 it was converted to form six flats.

Redheugh House is significant to Kilbirnie because of its association with the Knox family. They were the most significant employer in the town from the mid-19th century and the firm is still in business today. The firm had three manufacturing mills in Kilbirnie. The Dennyholm Mill has been demolished. Part of the Stoneyholm Mill its engine house and gatepiers remain to the centre of the town and are listed at category B (listed at category B, LB7523).

Increasing prosperity in the late 19th century meant that people, particularly industrialists, could afford to build large houses for themselves. Consequently this building type is not rare for this date. Traditional Scottish design details such as crowstepped gables, corner turrets and crenelated parapets were very fashionable for large houses. Redheugh House is a notable example of a large house from this period, because of the quality of its Scots Baronial design and stonework detailing. It also retains some good interior decoration (see Architectural and Historic Interest Section below).

It is likely that the former Redheugh Farm buildings (which had been the first buildings on the site) were remodelled in the later 19th century as an ancillary building for the main house. The building is painted stone and render. The buildings has crowstepped gables, stone stacks and there is a small turret on the right corner of the gable on the south elevation. These detailing are likely to have been added as part of the later 19th century remodelling to match Redheugh House. This building (now known as 1, 2 and 3 Redheugh Court) was converted to three houses around 2000 and the interior and alterations to the roof date to around that time. There is a later (around 2015) addition at the southeast corner of No.3.

A single gatepier survives adjacent to the southwest corner of 1 Redheugh Court. This gatepier has lost its balustraded screen wall and is a remnant. In light of the extensive alterations and loss of historic fabric 1, 2 and 3 Redheugh Court and the gatepier are not considered to meet the criteria for listing and are excluded from the listing.

Architectural or Historic Interest

Interior

The interior of the house has been altered following its subdivision into six apartments. However, the areas which have been seen retain some good late 19th century detailing. The entrance hall and staircase survive largely unaltered and have decoratively carved columns and cornices.

The large reception room in the southwest corner (part of the 1905 additions) has a number of good decorative features, such as the columned timber screen and the imposing stone fireplace. Photographs of this room taken in 1979 when it was in use as a hostel show that it had a decorative frieze and the adjoining room had a decorative plaster ceiling. These features have been lost. There was also at least one room with a coloured painted ceiling at that time, but it not known if this survives. Some parts of the interior have not been seen and therefore cannot be assessed at this time.

In its current form the interior continues to be of interest because significant elements of the late 19th century interior scheme survive. The quality and survival of the interior detailing evidences the importance of the building at its height in the early 20th century when it was owned by a wealthy local industrialist.

Plan form

Redheugh is a multi-phase building and its incremental plan form creating an L-plan footprint is not exceptional for a building of this date. The principal rooms face the south lawn with a staircase at the rear which was a common plan layout at the time.

The arrangement of the large reception room in the southwest corner (part of the 1905 additions) with a raised section behind a columned screen wall suggests the room was designed as a billiard room addition to the house. As important local industrialists, the Knox family may have built the 1905 extension to entertain clients as well as for their personal use, as it was fashionable to add billiard room additions at this time.

Technological excellence or innovation, material or design quality

Redheugh is a multi-phase building constructed over a 30 year period. The earliest phases of the house were designed by Clarke and Bell towards the end of their careers and Redheugh is a well-executed example of their domestic work in a Scots Baronial Style. It has some good stone detailing, including corner turrets with decorative slate roofs, crenelated parapets and window architraves and carved panels. The majority of the decorative detailing is on the public south and east elevations, both of which are largely unchanged from the early 20th century. A photograph from around 1900 shows stone balustrading to the entrance steps to match the gatepiers, and this no longer survives.

The early 20th century additions copy the style of the earlier house with Scots Baronial features. The addition to the south elevation in particular with its crenelated parapet is in the style of a Scottish tower house. These additions were designed by the local architect, John Snodgrass, who had previously designed the Knox Institute in Kilbirnie for the family in 1892.

The balustraded screen wall and gatepier attached to the east elevation, probably date to the 1905 work, because they are similar in design to the gatepiers and quadrant walls linked to Redheugh Lodge which was also designed by Snodgrass in 1905 (listed at category B, LB7503). The stonework detailing shows that they were built after the wall onto which they are joined, and would have provided a formal entrance to the ancillary buildings to the north of the house. A 1979 photograph shows a corresponding gatepier and balustrade screen wall, which was largely removed around 2000 to widen the access to the cul-de sac development to the rear of the house. A fragment of this wall and a gatepier survives adjacent to the southwest corner of 1 Redheugh Court.

The architects William Clarke (1809-1889) and George Bell (1814-1887) met while they both worked as draftsmen for William Burn in the 1820s. They jointly entered a competition for the Lanarkshire County Buildings and their successful design ultimately resulted in them forming a partnership in 1843. The partnership was immediately prominent as a result of this achievement and it was then strengthened by their success in the Edinburgh Free Church competition two years later. Clarke was one of the leading members of the Architectural Institute of Scotland founded in 1850 and later in the Glasgow Architectural Society delivering its opening address in 1864.

The firm's contracts included schools, churches and some commercial buildings in the early years but from the 1870s onwards domestic villas and estate houses were the core of their work. Most of their buildings were in the west of Scotland particularly around Glasgow. Other examples of their large house commissions works include Dalnair House in Drymen in 1884 (listed at category B, LB49000), Arkleton House in Ewes 1884 (listed at category B, LB9727) and Adamton House near Prestwick in 1885 (listed at category B, LB52302).

Setting

On the 2nd Edition Ordnance Survey Map the house is shown within its own large garden grounds with paths and walkways enclosed by shelterbelt trees. In the earlier 20th century the estate setting of the house was enhanced. This included a new access drive with associated gate lodge and gatepiers (listed at category B). The earlier former farm buildings are also likely to have been remodelled as part of this work.

The house is on higher ground to the north of the town of Kilbirnie where the owner had his thread manufacturing business.

When the house was subdivided in around 2000 a new cul de sac of houses was built immediately to the rear of the house (Redheugh Court). The former southern access drive to the houses was blocked and a new entrance to the site created from the east. Houses were built in the former walled garden and two new streets were built to infill the south and west areas of the garden (Redheugh Avenue and Broster Meadows).

The late 19th century setting of the house has been significantly altered by the later developments and the setting does not add to the special interest of the building.

Regional variations

There are no known regional variations.

Close Historical Associations

There are no known associations with a person or event of national importance (2018).

Redheugh House was built for Bryce Muir Knox of W & J Knox Ltd. The family and its company are historically significant to the town of Kilbirnie. With three mills in the town they were a thread, flax and later fishing nets manufacturing business that was a major employer in Kilbirnie in the 19th century, and remains in business over 250 years later. Redheugh House is one of two surviving large houses associated with the company.

Statutory address, category of listing changed from B to C and listed building record revised in 2018. Previously listed as 'Redheugh'.

External Links

Historic Environment Scotland Listing
Wikidata IDs Q17829989 Q56616755

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