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Latitude: 55.7787 / 55°46'43"N
Longitude: -2.3455 / 2°20'43"W
OS Eastings: 378424
OS Northings: 653987
OS Grid: NT784539
Mapcode National: GBR D12M.0B
Mapcode Global: WH8X7.Y07S
Plus Code: 9C7VQMH3+FQ
Entry Name: Former Duns Sheriff Court, 8 Newtown Street
Listing Name: Former Duns Sheriff Court excluding flat-roofed extension adjoining to east, 8 Newtown Street, Duns
Listing Date: 22 December 1994
Last Amended: 9 September 2015
Category: C
Source: Historic Scotland
Source ID: 405601
Historic Scotland Designation Reference: LB26556
Building Class: Cultural
Also known as: Duns, Newton Road, Sheriff Court
ID on this website: 200405601
Location: Duns
County: Scottish Borders
Town: Duns
Electoral Ward: Mid Berwickshire
Traditional County: Berwickshire
Tagged with: Courthouse
Sash and case and casement windows in timber frames. Horizontal panes to front elevation, 12 pane glazing to rear elevation. Grey slates with fish scale courses to front pitch. Ashlar-coped skews to rear. Coped ashlar stacks with octagonal cans. Decorative cast iron rainwater heads.
The interior, seen 2014, has been significantly remodelled and altered (including court room furniture replacement) circa 1989 to accommodate the changing needs of the building and the court service.
Low ashlar boundary wall to Newtown Street with saddleback coping.
The former Duns Sheriff Court (now county offices) is a mid-19th public building in the Tudor-Jacobean style, prominently located near the centre of Newtown Street, Duns. While the architect of this building is not currently known, the symmetrical Jacobean-influenced principal elevation enhances the interest of the streetscape, bearing some similarities to David Cousin's Corn Exchange in Dalkeith. It is a modified example of a pre-1860 court, dating to shortly before the influential reforms of the Sheriff Court Houses (Scotland) Act of 1860. As a result of this act the building was modified internally and an additional courtroom added to the rear of the building in 1904. The interior has since been comprehensively refurbished in the 1960s and late 20th century as part of the Scottish Courts Service refurbishment programme.
The development of the court house as a building type in Scotland follows the history of the Scottish legal system and wider government reforms. The majority of purpose-built court houses were constructed in the 19th century as by this time there was an increase in the separation of civic, administrative and penal functions into separate civic and institutional buildings, and the resultant surge of public building was promoted by new institutional bodies. The introduction of the Sheriff Court Houses (Scotland) Act of 1860 gave a major impetus to the increase and improvement of court accommodation and the provision of central funding was followed by the most active period of sheriff court house construction in the history of the Scottish legal system, and many new court houses were built or reworked after this date.
The concrete, stone and plate glass extension (circa 1967-9) to the right was not considered to be of special architectural or historic interest at the time of the review (2014-15).
Category changed from B to C, statutory address and listed building record revised as part of the Scottish Courts Listing Review, 2014-15. Previously listed as 'Newtown Street, Sheriff Court with Boundary Wall'.
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.
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