Description

William Burn 1821, constructed 1824-8. Large Ionic Greek Revival mansion house, 2-storey, concealed attic and basement, with single-storey and basement kitchen and private apartments around sunken rear service court. Main facades: polished ashlar, ground floor windows architraved and corniced, 1st floor windows without architraves. Basement and attic blind, latter behind full entablature, cornice and parapet.

E Elevation: 7-bay dominated by centre hexastyle fluted Ionic columned and pedimented portico. Coffered ceiling to portico on twin inner columns.

S elevation: 11-bay, end bays set back with vestigal antae pilaster angles. Centre 3 bays within pilastered Thrasyllus portico approached by steps. Block pediment.

W elevation: 5-bay, centre projecting garden entrance with tripartite segmental-arched doorway within twin pilastered angles. Block pediment. Single-storey and basement private family wing to N, 5-bays, the end 2 projecting for the family bedroom. Cornice and blocking course. Piended roofs and 2 corniced stacks of exceptional height.

N elevation: coursed squared rubble. 4 bays to family wing, piend-roofed lean-to to front. Lower 4-bays projecting centre with dormer-head windows breaking eaves at 1st. Off-centre segmental-arched cart entrance. Kitchen court encircled by lean-to slate roof on cast-iron columns with bell capitals. Rear of main house 5-bay, 2 windows tripartite.

Kitchen at NE angle: cruciform single-storey and basement with single architraved window and antae pilasters to E elevation. Entablature, cornice and blocking course. Modern door in N elevation. Tall wallhead stack demolished.

Piended slate roofs. Timber framed cupola over hall, rectangular latern over stair. Ashlar stacks. Windows sash and case, 12-pane glazing pattern.

INTERIOR: sophisticated plan separating private from public apartments. Central full-height saloon with 4 scagliola-clad columns, Ionic at ground, Corinthian at 1st and cast-iron interlaced balcony railings. Pendentive dome with stained glass. Brass balusters to main stair focuses on copy of J S Copley's painting of Admiral Duncan receiving the surrender of the Dutch at the Battle of Camperdown.

Marble chimney pieces (highly ornate entwined foliage and cherbus in drawing room) cast-ron grates (with copper inlay in the library) some with folding doors, plaster cornices. Original timber doorpieces etc. Coffered ceilings to principal rooms. Timber and copper-grid book cases to library. Circular breakfast room now contains golf club bar. Simple attic rooms. Windowless servants accommodation in basement off primitivist Tuscan-columned hall.

Rubble-built boundary walls with stone copes to the estate.

Statement of Interest

The largest Greek Revival house remaining in Scotland, and one in which Burn perfected his sequence of self-contained private and public apartments. Built for Robert Duncan the son of Admiral Adam Duncan, Viscount Camperdown, native Dundonian and victor of the Battle of Camperdown over the Dutch in 1797. Parkland laid out by Robert Duncan and David Taylor. In municipal ownership from 1946.

External Links

• Historic Environment Scotland Listing
• Wikidata Q17575440

External links are from the relevant listing authority and, where applicable, Wikidata. Wikidata IDs may be related buildings as well as this specific building. If you want to add or update a link, you will need to do so by editing the Wikidata entry.

Recommended Books

• 
  Derbyshire (Pevsner Architectural Guides) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Specifications for Building Conservation: Volume 1: External Structure: Practical Examples v. 2
• 
  Warwickshire (Pevsner Architectural Guides) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Pioneers of Modern Design: From William Morris to Walter Gropius (Penguin Art & Architecture)
• 
  Central Leinster: Kildare, Laois and Offaly (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of Ireland)
• 
  Hampshire: South (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)