Description

Dated 1880. 2-storey and attic, 4-bay asymmetrical L-plan house with Baronial details; advanced crowstepped-gabled bay with 5-light, canted window at ground to left; full-height, square-plan, gabled, corbelled entrance bay to internal angle abutting further, conical-roofed, engaged circular corbelled tower to right. Squared and coursed rubble with polished and stugged sandstone ashlar dressings. String course between ground and 1st floors, continuous as hood-mould over heraldic shield to doorway; lintel course to circular tower; string course across entrance bay gable, continuous as eaves course to tower; eaves course to bays to right. Chamfered reveals to windows; stone mullions; long and short margins to openings; square terminal dies to window cills.

SE (PRINCIPAL) ELEVATION: moulded, stop-chamfered doorpiece at ground in central entrance bay; dated heraldic panel above; timber-panelled door with rectangular-fanlight; window at 1st floor; attic window to gable above. window at 1st floor to circular tower abutting to right. Bipartite window with single window above in each of 2 bays, set back to right; small centred, gabletted dormer above. Canted window with blocking course at ground in advanced bay to left; canopied bipartite window with moulded angles at 1st floor; round-arched attic window to block-finialled gablehead above.

SW (SIDE) ELEVATION: irregularly fenestrated, 2-bay elevation. Window at ground in bay to centre; non-aligned window at 1st floor; tall, wallhead stack above. Window at each floor in bay to left.

NW (REAR) ELEVATION: irregularly fenestrated elevation with gables and single-storey, L-plan addition at ground projecting from left.

Predominantly 2- and 4-pane timber sash and case windows. Banded grey and purple slate roof; grey slate fish scale roof to tower; decorative, pierced stone ridge; dressed rubble, corniced stacks; predominantly cast-iron rainwater goods with decorative attachments and hoppers.

INTERIOR: timber architraves, skirting boards and panelled doors at ground floor; cast-iron barley-twist balusters to stair with timber handrail and panelled newel post; unseen at 1st floor, 1998.

BOUNDARY WALLS, GATEPIERS AND RAILINGS: low cope, squared rubble walls along SE boundary; square-plan, bull-faced ashlar sandstone gatepiers with ashlar cap; replacement cope-mounted railings.

ANCILLARY BUILDING: single storey, 2 x 1 bay, rubble, pitched- roofed ancillary building sited to SE behind boundary wall. 2-leaf boarded doors to wide entrance to W, gabled elevation. Window in each bay to N (bay to right formerly segmental-arched doorway, now blocked). Grey slate roof; stone ridge; stone skews; coped, rubble gablehead stack to E.

INTERIOR: not seen, 1998.

Statement of Interest

A substantial house which stands back from King Street, now converted to a residential home for the elderly. With its Baronial detail and distinctive conical-roofed, corbelled tower, it shares similarities with the Sumburgh Hotel, Drossness, Shetland, designed by David Rhind. It also bears similarities to the work of the Orkney architect, T S Peace.

External Links

• Historic Environment Scotland Listing
• Wikidata Q17827872

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

• 
  A Buying and Owning a Listed Building: A Brief Guide
• 
  Northumberland (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Surrey (The Buildings of England) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  [(Cumberland and Westmorland)] [By (author) Nikolaus Pevsner] published on (January, 1967)
• 
  Pioneers of Modern Design: From William Morris to Walter Gropius (Penguin Art & Architecture)
• 
  Berkshire (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)