Former Kingussie Sheriff Court, 36 High Street, Kingussie, Kingussie, Highland

Description

Designed by Matthews and Laurie in 1865 and altered into offices in 2015-16 by the Highland Council Property and Housing Service. This building is a 2-storey, symmetrical 3-bay, rectangular plan classical style former court house. It is built in coursed and squared sandstone with tooled ashlar sandstone dressings, including long and short quoins to the corners and centre bay, and a pronounced eaves band and cornice.

The principal (south) elevation has a slightly advanced and pedimented centre bay. The 2-leaf timber panelled entrance door is under a decoratively bracketted cornice. There are moulded architraves to the doorway and window openings. The panelled window aprons are linked by a band course at the first floor.

There is 4-pane glazing pattern in timber sash and case windows throughout.

The end chimney stacks are corniced and each have later 19th century square cans with flared caps and barley twist detailing at the corners. There is a piended platform slate roof.

There is a corniced stone wing wall with a pedestrian gate attached to the east of the main elevation. A roofless stone outbuilding (former toilet block) comprising 3 stalls is to the southeast of the court house and is attached to tall and coped coursed rubble boundary walls which surround the court house at the east, south and west.

The interior was seen in 2015. It has a good decorative interior scheme and much of the 1865 plan form remains, with the public offices on the ground floor and a main courtroom on the first floor. There is an entrance lobby incorporating a dog-leg staircase with a curved and decorative cast iron balustrade and timber handrail. There are basket arches in the ground floor corridors and a cast iron pot-bellied stove to the south. The ground floor corridor provides access to three timber lined cells with small high level windows. The timber panelled cell doors have a hatch, spy hole and lock. The former courtroom has a coombed ceiling with three decorative vents and a timber bench. The secondary rooms and offices have simple moulded cornicing and panelled doors and timber floors, some have fireplaces with timber surrounds.

Statement of Interest

The former Kingussie Sheriff Court dates to 1876 and was designed by the successful Highland architectural practice of Matthews and Lawrie. Unusually for a court house built following the 1860 Act it is designed in the classical style, which is more often seen in early 19th century court house designs. The building is a good example of civic architecture in the town centre of Kingussie with a distinctive and largely unaltered street elevation.

Age and Rarity

Kingussie Sheriff Court was designed by the prominent Highland architectural practice Matthews and Lawrie in 1865, and was completed in the same year. This court house was built to cover the judicial requirements of the local community and the wider area of Badenoch. It replaced the previous court house of 1829, a building which originally served as the assembly rooms. The former court house and outbuilding is first shown on the 1st Edition Ordnance Survey map (surveyed in 1870 and published in 1872) and the footprint of the court house is largely unchanged from that shown on this map.

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 this 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.

Court houses constructed post 1860 generally had a solely legal purpose and did not incorporate a prison, other than temporary holding cells. The courts were designed in a variety of architectural styles many relying heavily on Scots Baronial features to reference the fortified Scottish building tradition. They also dispensed with large public spaces such as county halls and instead provided bespoke office accommodation for the sheriff, judge and clerks, and accommodating the numerous types of court and holding cells, as can be seen at Kingussie.

The former Kingussie Sheriff Court was amongst the first wave of court houses to be built following the 1860 Act and is a well-detailed 19th century civic building (see Architectural or Historic Interest section below).

Architectural or Historic Interest

Interior

The court house was undergoing refurbishment when it was visited in 2015 following the outbreak of timber rot and planned re-use of the building. The interior decorative scheme will be retained however the timber sheriffs' bench will be removed to the ground floor and re-used as a reception desk.

Plan form

The rectangular plan form of the building with the main courtroom located on the first floor is typical for this building type. The main courtroom was subdivided, possibly after circa 1970, however the interventions made are intended to be reversible. There has been some slight modification to the surrounding offices, including some later partitions and changes to room functions, which is not unusual in a building of this type in continuous use, however the basic internal plan remains.

Technological excellence or innovation, material or design quality

As prime civic buildings, courts usually had a significant amount of decorative work on the exterior. The former Kingussie Sheriff Court has a proportionate amount of good quality stonework for a small rural court house, particularly to the principal elevation which is largely unaltered. There is some evidence of a blocked external entrance to the west (now a toilet) that may date to the early 20th century.

Unusually for a post 1860 court house it is designed in the neoclassical style. Early 19th century court houses were typically neoclassical or Renaissance in style to convey their status as important public buildings. After 1860 this style was superseded by Scots Baronial for court house design; however a few court houses from this period, such as Kingussie, continued the classical tradition. Other examples of post-1860 neoclassical court houses include Oban, Paisley and Banff, as well as Portree which was designed by Matthews and Laurie in same year as Kingussie.

The architectural partnership of James Matthews and William Lawrie ran from 1864 until 1887, with offices in Aberdeen and Inverness. Matthews and Lawrie were commissioned to design a number of court houses in the Highland region, such as at Portree (1865), Lochmaddy (1875) and Fort William (1876). In 1877 Mackenzie's son, Alexander Marshall Mackenzie, was taken into partnership and thereafter Matthews ran the practice as two separate partnerships - Matthews and Mackenzie in Aberdeen and Elgin, and Matthews and Lawrie in Inverness.

Setting

The court house is at the centre of Kingussie High Street and its importance as the premier public building in the town is emphasised by being set back from the building line of the rest of the street. The immediate setting has largely been unaltered since the time of construction and that shown on the 1st Edition Ordnance Survey map.

Regional variations

There are no known regional variations.

Close Historical Associations

There are no known associations with a person or event of national importance at present (2016).

Statutory address, category of listing changed from B to C and listed building record revised in 2017 as part of the Former Scottish Court Houses Listing Review 2014-16. Previously listed as 'High Street, Court House'.

External Links

Historic Environment Scotland Listing
Wikidata IDs Q17826853 Q56642798

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