Description

James Pearson Alison, 1898. 2-storey and attic, 2-bay, symmetrical tenement and shops forming part of terrace, with bipartite windows and inscribed escutcheon (see NOTES) flanked by Dutch-inspired, consoled, pedimented dormers breaking eaves. Squared, snecked yellow sandstone with polished ashlar dressings to front; predominantly brick to rear. Consoled, corniced fascia to left shopfront; 1st-floor string course; dentilled 2nd-floor cornice; eaves cornice. Roll-moulded window margins; bipartite, stone-mullioned windows at 1st and 2nd floors, with projecting cills and conch details above at 1st floor, and corbelled projecting cills and label-stopped hoodmoulds at 2nd floor. Projecting, piend-roofed, central stair bay to rear, flanked by piend-roofed dormers

Some 3-pane and 4-pane glazing in timber sash and case windows. Grey slate roof with stone ridge; ashlar-coped skews; coped ashlar end stacks with circular buff clay cans. Cast-iron rainwater goods.

INTERIOR: Mosaic lobby floor now concealed within left shop; stone tenement stair with decorative cast-iron balusters, polished timber handrail, and timber-boarded doors with tall 2-pane fanlights to 2 closets on left and right of each landing (see NOTES).

Statement of Interest

An elegant, well-proportioned, late-19th-century block with earlier portions to the rear, situated at the centre of Hawick's High Street and making a significant contribution to the streetscape.

James Pearson Alison (1862-1932) was Hawick's most prominent architect. He commenced practice in the town in 1888 and remained there until his death, during which period he was responsible for a large number of buildings of widely varying types and styles, including a considerable proportion of Hawick's listed structures.

The escutcheon between the dormers is inscribed: 'TAK TENT O' TIME ERE TIME BE TINT'. No date is visible but published sources state that it is a fragment of a 1683 sundial which had been incorporated into a mid-18th-century building that previously stood on the site. The right dormer is dated 1898.

The closets on the tenement stair landings were probably communal water closets for the flats, and their survival is uncommon.

No 25 was previously listed jointly with Nos 23, 27 and 29, now split into separate listings. List description revised following resurvey (2008).

External Links

• Historic Environment Scotland Listing
• Wikidata Q77781003

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

• 
  Old House Care and Repair
• 
  Norfolk 1: Norwich and North-East: Norwich and North-east v. 1 (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Hampshire: Winchester and the North (The Buildings of England) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Cambridgeshire (Pevsner Architectural Guides) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Dorset (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Suffolk: East (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)