Description

James Pearson Alison, dated 1897, with 20th-century additions to rear. 2-storey, Classical clubhouse with Doric porch and balustraded 1st-floor balcony on consoles to recessed 3-bay central section, projecting outer pedimented bays, and gabled hall to rear. Tooled yellow sandstone ashlar with polished ashlar dressings. Base course; blank first-floor frieze; eaves course; moulded cornice with antifixae. Rusticated quoins. Segmental-arched windows in lugged architraves at ground floor, rectangular architraved windows elsewhere.

NW (PRINCIPAL) ELEVATION: 6 stone steps to central, multi-pane-glazed, timber front door with rectangular fanlight set within Roman Doric twin-columned porch with frieze bearing the inscription: 'MEMORIAL STONE LAID BY MARGARET COUNTESS OF DALKEITH 16TH OCTOBER 1897'. Balustraded balcony above, supported on console brackets to flanking bays. Projecting outer bays each with two windows at ground floor; single canted window at 1st floor crowned by balustrade; oculus in pediment. Additional 2-bay section to outer right with secondary door.

NE (SIDE) ELEVATION: 3-bay, Classical section to right with segmental-pedimented dormers. Broad gabled hall to left with single tripartite mullioned and transomed window. Additional smaller, 20th-century, recessed, rendered gabled hall to outer left.

Predominantly plate glass in timber sash-and-case windows. Corniced ashlar stacks with buff clay cans. Grey slate roof. Predominantly cast-iron rainwater goods.

INTERIOR: central lobby with parquet flooring leading to scale-and-platt stair. Some cornices. Stone cellar with some brick partitions.

Statement of Interest

An elegant, late-19th-century, Classical clubhouse still in its original use, occupying a corner site close to the heart of Hawick and designed by James Pearson Alison (1862-1932), Hawick's most prominent architect.

Alison had commenced practice in the town in 1888 and remained there until his death in 1932, during which period he was responsible for a large number of buildings of widely varying types and styles, including the adjacent Congregational Church. Alison was assisted on this project, originally known as the Constitutional Club, by Alexander Inglis, who had been apprenticed to him in 1891 and remained as assistant. Inglis subsequently spent a brief period working in Edinburgh before returning to Hawick in 1902 to carry on his recently deceased uncle's joinery business as architect and contractor.

Boxed-in transverse spandrels in the main part of the first-floor function room, which now has a false ceiling, suggest a hidden light cast-iron frame similar to that used by Alison for the halls at the former St George's West Church (now Teviot & Roberton Parish Church). The rear snooker hall also has a false ceiling. The second-floor flat, extending only across the north-eastern end of the main building and lit by the dormers on the side elevation, was originally the club master's residence.

The clubhouse was constructed on the site of the East Toll, and cost £3,976 to build.

External Links

• Historic Environment Scotland Listing
• Wikidata Q17834936

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

• 
  This Old House: Restoring, Rehabilitating, and Renovating an Older House
• 
  Suffolk: East (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  [(Cumberland and Westmorland)] [By (author) Nikolaus Pevsner] published on (January, 1967)
• 
  Kent: North East and East (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Surrey (The Buildings of England) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Dorset (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)