The White House, 92 Hepburn Gardens, St Andrews, St Andrews, Fife

Description

Dating from 1904, The White House at 92 Hepburn Gardens is a two-storey house, built in the English Arts and Crafts style and designed by Mills and Shepherd. The building's service area was extended to the northwest sometime between 1911 and 1937. Set back from the road and accessed by a private drive, the house is set within a large garden and overlooks Lade Braes Walk and Kinness Burn to the southeast.

The White House is an irregular L-plan and the walls are harled and painted. The entrance (northwest) elevation has a corner entrance sheltered by a tapered, open loggia. The side (northeast) elevation has a shallow, double-height canted bay window and a later mono-pitched addition. The rear (southeast) elevation has two protruding gables, two dormer windows breaking the eaves and a multi-pane door leading to the garden. There are metal gutter support brackets below the eaves around most of the property.

The windows are largely one, two or three-light, multi-pane timber casements, some of which have transoms and mullions. The house has a mixture of pedimented and flat-roofed dormer windows breaking the eaves. The steep, gabled roof is covered in slates and there are four tall rendered chimneystacks with clay cans that are predominantly offset along the roof ridge. The house has simple timber bargeboards, fascias and soffits.

Internally, there are original Arts and Crafts features, including stained timber beams in the principal rooms, plain moulded cornicing, timber picture rails and panelled doors. There is a wide, timber staircase, well-lit by a large window, with moulded timber balusters and handrail. There are a number of fireplaces with plain stone surrounds and decorative timber mantelpieces.

A detached, flat-roofed, double garage, dating from after 1967, is located to the southwest of the house (and is excluded from the listing). The entrance drive has circular gatepiers topped by domed coping stones that is integrated into a sandstone rubble boundary wall with a rounded cope.

In accordance with Section 1 (4A) of the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) (Scotland) Act 1997 the following are excluded from the listing: garage to southwest.

Historical development

There was significant residential development in St Andrews in the late-19^th and early-20^th century, particularly westwards away from the town centre. Villa construction developed during this time along Hepburn Gardens, Buchanan Gardens and Mount Melville Road (renamed Hepburn Gardens sometime between 1914 and 1967). Housing development in the area slowed with the outbreak of war in 1914 before recommencing in the 1920s and 1930s.

The White House at 92 Hepburn Gardens (then known as Mount Melville Road) was built in 1904 for William Norman Boase (1870-1938), a Dundee jute manufacturer and Provost of St Andrews between 1927 and 1936 (St Andrews Citizen).

Architects' plans (dated February 1904) show The White House as a roughly L-plan house with a substantial living area, including hall, drawing room, dining room and a purpose-built bicycle store close to the front door. The plans show the house was built with extensive service accommodation in the northwest section of the house, including stores, coal room, laundry, scullery and servants' living accommodation upstairs (Mills and Shepherd).

W N Boase commissioned Mills and Shepherd to draw up plans for alterations and additions to the service area (the plans are dated 1911), to increase the footprint at the rear (northwest) of the property. These plans show a gun room, a servants' hall, a new coal store and additional servants' bedrooms and bathroom were proposed, as well as a loggia entrance on the west elevation with a courtyard garden behind (Mills and Shepherd, 1911). These works were not carried out as designed. Instead, the laundry room was reconfigured, and a sitting room added on the ground floor. Two bedrooms and a bathroom were added to the first floor and a single-storey toilet extension was added to the northeastern section of the service area. These additions and alterations are believed to have been completed in around 1937 (information courtesy of the owner). The current detached garage was added to the southwest of the house sometime between 1967 and 1974. A small mono-pitched structure was added to the northeast elevation sometime in the mid-20^th century.

Plans were drawn up in 1923 for a detached garage and living accommodation to the northwest of the house and closer to the main road. The elevation drawings depict a rectangular plan building with a garage on the right and a gabled, two-storey accommodation section on the left (Mills and Shepherd). Ordnance Survey maps show a building was built in the proposed location sometime between 1938 and 1958. This building is now a separate property and is known as The White Lodge (2021).

Statement of Interest

The White House at 92 Hepburn Gardens meets the criteria of special architectural or historic interest for the following reasons:

Dating from 1904, it is an early example of an Arts and Crafts style house in Scotland and is also an early example of residential work in St Andrews of the work of Mills and Shepherd.

The house is representative of the Arts and Crafts style and retains external and internal features characteristic of the movement, including bold massing of white-harled walls, broad roofs, tall chimneystacks and beamed ceilings.

The house is largely as originally built, and the plan form and original layout is largely unchanged. Although there has been some minor later alteration, the building's Arts and Crafts style, historic character or authenticity has been retained.

The historic setting, including its self-contained grounds, is well-retained.

In accordance with Section 1 (4A) of the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) (Scotland) Act 1997 the following are excluded from the listing: garage to southwest.

Architectural interest:

Design

The White House is one of the earliest houses designed by Mills and Shepherd in St Andrews. The design and construction of the house takes some inspiration from earlier Scottish building traditions, including the use of steeply pitched roofs and dormer windows breaking the roof eaves. Its predominantly English Arts and Crafts style is reflected in the bold massing of the white rendered walls, broad roofs, tall chimneystacks and beamed ceilings, reflecting the influence of C F A Voysey and M H Baillie Scott, English architects of the period (Muthesius, pp.43, 49).

The White House represents the tastes and social aspirations of its first owner, W Norman Boase. The Arts and Crafts style of house design aspired to a simplified form of modern living in the Edwardian period which broke with the more lavish period of Victorian building and interior design that preceded it.

The slightly projecting eaves, full height gables and compact windows are consistent with Mills and Shepherd's work (as seen at 104 and 106 Hepburn Gardens [listed at category B, LB40936], Dinmont in Buchanan Gardens and Cryanreuch in Windmill Road). Their use at The White House contribute to its pared-back aesthetic that became particularly prevalent at the start of the 20^th century (Service, p.20). The exterior of The White House, finished with a rendering of roughcast and painted white, was a typical Arts and Crafts feature intended to achieve simplicity, and one which Mills and Shepherd frequently employed in their work.

The extended plan form taking the form of an L-plan is largely retained and is a typical characteristic of larger suburban English Arts and Crafts style houses, such as Broadleys and Perrycroft by C F A Voysey, Blackwell by M H Baillie Scott and Greywalls in Gullane by Edwin Lutyens (listed at category A, LB1337). The use of L-shaped and butterfly plan forms conforms to the Arts and Crafts principles of design, proposed by Hermann Muthesius and others in the early 20^th century, whereby form follows function. For example, kitchens and service areas were usually constructed to the east and north for coolness and recreation rooms were often designed in the south and west of houses to take advantage of the afternoon and evening sun (Carruthers, p.185). Particular attention was given to prospect to ensure that the principal recreation rooms had the best views towards the gardens. This design is seen at The White House where the principal rooms face the picturesque Lade Braes to the south and, in common with Arts and Crafts houses, natural light is utilised, particularly in the protruding gables. This connection with nature and the desire to bring the garden into the home was one of the key principles of the Arts and Crafts Movement.

The Arts and Crafts Movement began in England with the theories of William Morris and was a reaction to the increased industrialisation and commodification perceived in 19^th century society. The movement took its name from the Arts and Crafts Exhibition Society, a group formed in 1887 in London, and embraced new ideas about the place of art and beauty in daily life. By the late-19^th century, a number of groups had formed which formalised the ideals of this new artistic taste. The Arts and Crafts movement reformed the design and manufacture of everything from house design to jewellery and furniture. It rejected excessive ornamentation and instead focussed on quality, local materials and a crafts-based approach to design. Following major innovations in the style in the late-19^th century, houses such as The White House in Helensburgh (designed by Baillie Scott) and Perrycroft in Herefordshire (designed by Voysey), provided inspiration for regional architectural practices who developed up-to-date suburban house designs for wealthy clients during the period 1900-1914.

The Arts and Crafts Movement gained momentum in Scotland from the late 1880s and architects such as Robert Lorimer, R R Anderson, R W Shultz, Frank Deas and A G Sydney Mitchell became well-known proponents of the style, designing a variety of houses of different sizes and scale. Charles Rennie Mackintosh, one of 'The Four' creators of the Glasgow Style, was also a key figure within the Scottish variant of the Arts and Crafts style. The Mackintosh-designed Hill House in Helensburgh is a more decorative version of the style but still reflects the goal of simple lines, traditional craftsmanship and aesthetic ideals.

Regionally, Mills and Shepherd capitalised on the influx of wealthy clients who were wanting to live in the St Andrews, Broughty Ferry and Dundee areas and commute to their businesses via the new railway links. This was a particular phenomenon in the first decade of the 20^th century as travel became easier and leisure pursuits more numerous and popular. Wealthy industrialists were demanding smaller country houses and villas in the suburbs that were set within extensive gardens and grounds. The houses built for the Boase family at The White House and the Todd family at Wayside (at 96 Hepburn Gardens) are characteristic of this form.

The 1904 architects' plans of the ground floor show the house was designed with a hall, a drawing room and dining room overlooking the grounds to the south. The service rooms, including pantry, kitchen, scullery and laundry rooms, were designed to go in the northwest section of the house (Mills and Shepherd). The plan of the first floor shows two large bedrooms with adjacent dressing rooms, two bathrooms and two separate toilets. The servants' accommodation and nursery rooms were in the north section of the house above the kitchen and service areas and accessed by a service stair. Its extensive service accommodation is narrower, more compact internally and stylistically plainer than the family section of the house, indicating its former function. Changes to the footprint include the addition of the mono-pitched structure on the northeast elevation and alterations to the footprint of the northwest (former service wing) in around 1937, however these changes have had a minimal impact on the overall original layout of the property because the historic character and Arts and Crafts style have been maintained.

Recent photographs show that the internal layout appears to be largely unaltered. The configuration of rooms, including the position of door and window openings, and the separation between family and service areas appears largely unaltered since that shown on the 1904 architects' plans. There have been some later alterations, such as the replacement of a window with a door leading outside in the former service pantry and the northernmost section of the former service area has been reconfigured when it was extended and reconfigured in the late 1930s.

The interior includes some good quality Arts and Crafts fixtures and fittings, including the main staircase, panelled doors, exposed timber beams, picture rails and built-in storage cupboards. Photographs show the fireplaces have plain stone surrounds rather than tiled (as depicted on Mills and Shepherd's plans), however it is not unusual for designed to be changed according to the preferences of the client. Photographs of the interior show simple forms with great attention to detail and quality craftsmanship important in the design. The craftsmen employed in the construction of the house were all local, some of whom had been employed on other Arts and Crafts style houses (their names are labelled on Mills and Shepherd's plans). The slater, Thomas Black, was also employed on the construction of Wayside at 96 Hepburn Gardens (designed by Robert Lorimer) in 1901-03. He operated his business from a premises in South Street, St Andrews.

The White House is a large Arts and Crafts villa that is largely unaltered externally and internally. While there is some internal alteration to the later section of the house it does not impact overall on the buildings' Arts and Crafts style, historic character or authenticity.

Setting

The White House is set within its own private grounds and is set back from the main road, accessed by entrance gatepiers and a driveway. The White House is located within the Hepburn Gardens Conservation Area (CA171) which is largely characterised by Arts and Crafts villas with extensive private grounds, by architects such as Mills and Shepherd, Gillespie and Scott, Robert Lorimer, and Haxton and Walker among others.

The development of the Arts and Crafts style along Hepburn Gardens was encouraged by a community of like-minded, wealthy clients who relocated to St Andrews to enjoy golf and other amenities. W N Boase (The White House) and his neighbour Charles Todd who lived at Wayside (96 Hepburn Gardens) both purchased land from the University to build their Arts and Craft-style houses and both were members of the Royal and Ancient Golf Club (Carruthers, pp.178 and 188).

The immediate setting of The White House has not changed significantly since its construction in 1904. It retains its original setting, semi-secluded and within a large garden, stretching down towards Lade Braes Walk to the south. The White House is largely shielded from view from the road and from the south, retaining its secluded nature which is characteristic of a large Arts and Crafts house. The building's orientation and its plan form have been deliberately designed to integrate the house and the setting, with a particular emphasis on the garden elevation, its recreational rooms and its number of windows.

Architects' plans and historic maps suggest the house to the northwest (now known as The White Lodge) was likely built as the garage and cottage accommodation in 1923. Now much altered, this building nevertheless forms a historic grouping with The White House. The gatepiers and boundary wall are of the same style and design, further indicating their historical and functional relationship to the house. As such, the changes to The White Lodge have not affected the overall historic setting of the site.

Historic interest:

Age and rarity

The Arts and Crafts movement reached its peak in Scotland between 1890 and 1914, during which time it was enthusiastically taken up by leading Scottish architects (see Design section above). Influenced by architectural journals and prevailing fashions, the English strain of the Arts and Crafts style was popular for domestic architecture in Scotland, particularly for villas in urban areas.

As towns expanded and rail access to large cities became easier and more affordable, suburban villas for the middle classes became a much more common building type. Increasing prosperity in the late-19^th century meant that people, particularly industrialists, could afford to building large houses for themselves. Finer developments in coastal towns, such as Gullane, Dunbar, St Andrews and Helensburgh, became popular for wealthy people who wanted to take advantage of leisure amenities such as golf, seaside attractions and outstanding views.

Suburban villas of this size are found across Scotland and, therefore, are not a rare building type. However, The White House is a notable and early example of an Arts and Crafts house which is largely unaltered.

Built in 1904, The White House is not only an early example of Mills and Shepherds' work, but it is an early example of the English-style Arts and Crafts house in Scotland. C F A Voysey's major buildings of a similar type were built in the 1890s, for example Perrycroft (1893), Annesley Lodge (1896) and Greyfriars (1896). The first examples of this English Arts and Crafts style in Scotland include M H Baillie Scott's The White House in Helensburgh (1899), Greywalls by Edwin Lutyens (1901), Drumadoon by William Leiper (1901-3), Wayside by Robert Lorimer (1902), and Windyhill (1900-02) and Hill House (1902-04), both by Charles Rennie Mackintosh. While the White House is not rare, it is a notable contemporary of this early group of Arts and Crafts houses in Scotland.

Mills and Shepherd operated from 1900 to 1966 and quickly became known for designing very stylish Arts and Crafts houses in St Andrews and Dundee. The White House was the second or third domestic commission by Mills and Shepherd and is a product of the suburban expansion of St Andrews in the Edwardian period (Dictionary of Scottish Architects). Other examples by Mills and Shepherd in St Andrews include 102 Hepburn Gardens (listed at category B, LB40928), 104 and 106 Hepburn Gardens (listed at category B, LB40936), both dating from 1907. Later, interwar examples include Cryanreuch (listed at category C, LB49603), Drumskaith (unlisted) and Dinmont (unlisted).

The White House is largely unaltered externally and internally and it retains much of its character with a number of features which are typical of the Arts and Crafts style.

Social historical interest

Social historical interest is the way a building contributes to our understanding of how people lived in the past, and how our social and economic history is shown in a building and/or in its setting.

The White House was built as a private house, set back from the road, within a newly established suburb of St Andrews now known for its Arts and Crafts style houses. St Andrews became a popular town for wealthy industrialists to live in because it was renowned for its fresh air and leisure amenities, particularly golf courses (Carruthers, p.177). The ability to commute, particularly to Dundee, was a further attraction.

The house has social historical interest as it demonstrates the interest of the period in reviving traditional techniques and building styles, largely for aesthetic purposes. The house is a built reminder of the social aspirations of its first owner, W Norman Boase, and adds to the social interest of the Hepburn Gardens suburb of St Andrews.

Overall however, there is no special interest under this heading.

Association with people or events of national importance

There is no association with a person or event of national importance.

W Norman Boase was a jute, hemp and flax manufacturer at Boase Spinning Company in Dundee, a company started by his father, William Lindsay Boase, in around 1861 (McManus168). His son became chairman of the company in 1920 and was appointed President of the Dundee Chamber of Commerce in the same year. W Norman Boase was Provost of St Andrews between 1927 and 1936 and, a keen golfer, Captain of the Royal and Ancient Golf Club from 1935 to 1936. The association is considered to be of local interest.

Other information

Mills and Shepherd replaced Gillespie and Scott as architects to the University of St Andrews from around 1910.

External Links

Historic Environment Scotland Listing

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