Description

1832. 2-storey, 3-bay, rectangular-plan, gabled former manse. Harled, squared and tooled granite. Base course, eaves course, plain quoins and margins to openings. Regular fenestration.

W (PRINCIPAL) ELEVATION: 2-storey, 3-bay, regular fenestation; letterbox fanlight over timber panelled door.

E (REAR) ELEVATION: 2-storey, advanced semicircular stair turret with piended roof breaking eaves to centre, flanked by small\piended roof dormers. Single storey, 3-bay, harled and slated, gabled addition to right with tall chimney stack to end gable.

N (SIDE) ELEVATION: gable end with windows to outer bays of ground floor.

S (SIDE) ELEVATION: blank gable end.

INTERIOR: typical symmetrical internal plan with reception rooms flanking the entrance hall and lobby withan elegant turned stone stair case to the rear. Flagged floor to hall and lobby. Fine quality timber skirting, door and window frames and panelled doors. Plain cornice plaster work to principal rooms.

12-pane, timber-framed, sash and case windows. Grey slates, lead flashing. Coped skews and chimney stacks to gable ends.

WALLED GARDEN INCORPORATING BEE BOLE: rectangular walled garden to rear (W) and side (S) of house. High, coped rubble wall incorporating rectangular stone lined bee bole to N side.

Statement of Interest

Formerly listed as 'The Old Manse'. The semicircular stair turret to the rear and fine interior woodwork suggest similar builders to Corrachree House, Tarland (see separate listing). Church Heritors Records indicate that the existing clay built manse was decaying and a new manse were approved by a Mr Brebner, a Heritor. Plans for the new manse were sent to the Heritors by a Mr Crombie in 1832 but it is unclear whether he is the builder/architect or an intermediary such as a writer or lawyer. Stylisitcally the house is a typical late eighteenth century, improvement era house; comfortable but not large, regular, neat and symmetrical. Three bays with a central fan-lit, door and flanking rectangular windows, a window to each bay upstairs aligned accordingly. Naismith has ascribed the prevalence of perfect related proportion in this building type to 'their [Scottish masons] natural instinct for disciplined thinking coupled to the spirit prevailing in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries for classical order and balance.....It would not be beyond expectation to find that the builders of the Scottish countryside, working in an age when order and balance were regarded as imperative, created well proportioned designs without effort...All of it down to earth and practical." A housing type born out of eighteenth century formal classicism and which from 1750 onwards spread from the small country house to the manse, farmhouse and inn throughout Scotland.

External Links

• Historic Environment Scotland Listing
• Wikidata Q17776750

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

• 
  Worcestershire Revised Edition (Buildings of England) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Yorkshire West Riding: Leeds, Bradford and the North (Pevsner Architectural Guides / Buildings of England)
• 
  Central Leinster: Kildare, Laois and Offaly (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of Ireland)
• 
  Old House Handbook: A Practical Guide to Care and Repair by Hunt. Roger ( 2008 ) Hardcover
• 
  Berkshire (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Period Property Manual (New Ed)