Description

Earlier - mid 19th century. 2-storey symmetrical 3-bay rectangular- plan classical villa. Cream sandstone polished ashlar; channelled ground floor; rubble sides and rear. Base course; dividing band course; cornice; blocking course; architraves to 1st floor windows.

S (ENTRANCE) ELEVATION: central entrance doorcase with fluted Greek Doric columns, single pilasters behind, and cornice; 6-panelled timber door; fanlight containing geometric glazing pattern; single window to 1st floor above and to both floors of flanking bays. Corniced, piend- roofed wing to E containing pedimented doorway; wing to W corniced, remains of pedimented opening visible above 2-leaf garage door.

12-pane timber sash and case windows with lying panes. Grey slate piended roof; corniced wallhead stacks.

INTERIOR: not seen 1996.

GATEPIERS AND BOUNDARY WALLS: rubble boundary walls to E and W, low coped boundary wall to street with pairs of gatepiers to E and to centre.

Statement of Interest

Dr Benjamin Bell of Hunthill, an eminent Edinburgh surgeon and farmer, speculated on the potential for development in the lands of Newington. In 1806, aware of the demand for countrified dwellings near the city, he advertised his intention to sell 58 plots of land within his 8.5 acres. On his death in the same year his son George Bell, also a surgeon, inherited the land and, in 1825, commissioned James Gillespie Graham to design a plan for new streets within the grounds of Newington House, bounded by the back garden walls of Minto Street, Salisbury Road, East Mayfield and Dalkeith Road. Feus were offered for sale and Blacket Place began to take shape, the houses possibly being built speculatively by one builder or building company. Security was an important feature of the development, with Gothic gates, the octagonal piers of which survive, locked at night and single storey lodges at the entrances from Minto Street and Dalkeith Road.

External Links

• Historic Environment Scotland Listing
• Wikidata Q17793065

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

• 
  Drawing up a Local Listed Building Consent Order: Historic England Advice Note 6
• 
  [(Bedfordshire, Huntingdon and Peterborough)] [By (author) Nikolaus Pevsner] published on (January, 1968)
• 
  Liverpool: Pevsner City Guide (Pevsner Architectural Guides: City Guides)
• 
  Gwent/Monmouthshire (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of Wales)
• 
  Gloucestershire 1: The Cotswolds: Cotswolds Pt. 1 (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  The Victorian House Manual (2nd Edition): How They Were Built, Improvements & Refurbishment, Solutions to All Common Defects - Includes Relevant ... ... Properties (Haynes Manual) (Haynes Manuals)