Description
A mid to late 19th century crofthouse and outbuildings in a traditional longhouse type L-plan with a detached thatched pig house to the rear (west) and a kailyard with an integrated milkhouse to the east. The buildings are rubble-built gabled with a variety of traditional roofing materials. The complex is also known as Mary Ann's Cottage, after the last owner and occupier, and is now open to the public as a museum (2023). It is located in a rural setting, just outside the small village of Dunnet, near Thurso.The three-bay, single-storey crofthouse lies to the centre, and has end chimneystacks, a Caithness slate roof, whitewashed walls, and a central door and eight-pane sash and case windows to the main (east) elevation. There is a lean-to extension to the rear, which was added around 1960 to provide a kitchen and W.C.
The adjoining outbuildings step down on either side of the crofthouse. There is a store/workshop and hen house or 'little barn' to the north, and a byre and stable to the south, each have corrugated metal roofs with skylights and two door openings. Rear or stable/byre partially rebuilt in blockwork. A cart shed and turnip store abut to the south, roofed with very large Caithness flags. A threshing barn (added in 1905) abuts to the south at right angles, with a roof of Caithness slates, a tiny window to the south elevation and a larger attic window to the west gable.
The detached pig house detached to the rear (west) is thatched in marram and has a small yard formed by upright Caithness flags. The kailyard is detached and located to the immediate east of the crofthouse and stable/byre. It is built of low drystone walls but has upright Caithness flags to the north. A rubble and slate milkhouse is integrated to the southwest corner of the kailyard, along with a peat neuk and a former duckhouse (later kennel) both of which have walls and roofs formed in Caithness flags.
The crofthouse comprises an entrance corridor, a bedroom to the south, and a kitchen to the north which provides access to a further bedroom, located behind the entrance corridor and the later lean-to at the rear. The interior is maintained as a museum and displays various household artefacts and furnishings from the 19th and early 20th century. Features include v-boarded panelling to the walls, two box beds, a chimney piece with an open hearth and cooking impedimentia. Various agricultural objects are displayed in the outbuildings, which largely have Caithness flags to the floor and roof structures dating from the 20th century. Stone slab trevisses (partitions) and troughs remain in the byre, and there are timber stall dividers in the stable. The milk house has shelving units made from Caithness flags.
Along the front of the house is a flagstone-paved close with a drainage channel, leading to a drain in front of the barn door.
Statement of Interest
A well-preserved example of a traditional croft complex. These vernacular buildings were once prolific across the Highlands and Islands, but those that survive substantially unaltered are rare. West Side Cottage continues to show regional traditional building methods and materials and retains a significant proportion of its historic fabric, 19th century footprint, vernacular form, character and setting. The retention and grouping of the crofthouse with its various ancillary structures is of special interest, particularly the thatched pig house.
The pig house is one of only around 40 buildings or groups of buildings in the Highlands that are known to retain an intact thatched roof. A Survey of Thatched Buildings in Scotland, published in 2016 by the Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings (SPAB), found there were only around 200 buildings of this type remaining in Scotland, most of which are found in small rural communities. Thatched buildings are often traditionally built, showing distinctive local and regional building methods and materials. Those that survive are important in helping us understand these traditional skills and an earlier way of life.
Statutory address and listed building record revised in 2023. Previously listed as 'West Side, Dunnet, (Mrs Calder)'.
External Links
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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