East Port Buildings, 269-277 High Street, Burntisland, Burntisland, Fife

Entry Name: East Port Buildings, 269-277 High Street, Burntisland

Listing Name: 265-279 (Odd Nos) High Street, East Port Buildings with Gates and Balconies

Listing Date: 3 August 1977

Category: B

Source: Historic Scotland

Source ID: 358460

Historic Scotland Designation Reference: LB22808

Building Class: Cultural

Also known as: Burntisland, 269-277 High Street, East Port Buildings

ID on this website: 200358460

Location: Burntisland

County: Fife

Town: Burntisland

Electoral Ward: Burntisland, Kinghorn and Western Kirkcaldy

Traditional County: Fife

Tagged with: Architectural structure

Description

Swanston and Legge, 1899. 3-storey, Flemish style tenement, public house and shops at ground on splayed corner site. Corner tower with bellcast roof and spire, finialled curvilinear gables and balconies. Painted ashlar and red sandstone with polychrome ashlar dressings. Base course, moulded string course, 2nd floor cill course and eaves cornice; architraved windows, round-headed and eliptical-arched openings (latter at 1st floor), hoodmoulds, stone transoms and mullions.

SE (CORNER) ELEVATION: chamfered corner entrance with heavily moulded doorcase, serpentine label-stops and decorative cast-iron gates concealing panelled, part-glazed door with decorative astragals and coloured leaded glazing, jettied 3-sided tower above with moulded panels below small round-headed window and sundial to each face at 1st floor and 3 larger windows at 2nd floor with decorative plasterwork frieze below copper bellcast roof with attenuated spire.

E ELEVATION: deep-set timber door with 4-leaf fanlight slightly to right of centre with large tripartite round-arched window to right and similar window in bay to left, both windows with raked cills, hoodmoulds and decorative foliate bosses; 1st floor with transomed eliptically-arched bipartite window in curvilinear outer framing to right, transomed bipartite French window with moulded surround and flanking pilasters to left over dentilled stone balcony on 3 foliate scrollwork consoles below cast-iron railings with decorative waterleaf and heraldic shield ironwork; 2nd floor with bipartite window to right under steeply sloping roof, transomed bipartite window in moulded surround with flanking pilasters to left below high curvilinear coped and finialled gable with drop finial and finialled flanking polygonal nookshafts.

S (HIGH STREET) ELEVATION: 7-bay (bays grouped 2-1-1-2-1). Slightly angled bay at approximate centre with finialled pilasters above ground floor, part-glazed tenement door at ground surmounted by pair of tiny glazed arches flanked by heavy columns and drop finials supporting 2 scrolled foliate consoles below balcony (as above). Entrance to right with tri-lobed moulded doorhead, decorative cast-iron gate and part-glazed door as above, inset panel above depicting original Port Buildings and wording "Site of East Port Gates of Original Burgh 1635-1825"; 2 large tripartite round-headed windows to right (detailed as above); mirrored pair of round-arched openings with decorative bosses to left, each with deep-set part-glazed door in traditional shopfront, shop to right with canvas canopy. 1st floor with transomed French window in moulded frame at approximate centre, 2 transomed bipartite windows in curvilinear outer framing to right and 1 to left; transomed bipartite window in square-headed moulded surround with finialled flanking pilasters to outer right and 2 to outer left above 5-consoled balcony (detailed as above) also with finialled flanking pilasters. 2nd floor with transomed round-headed window at centre below small dormer-type tower with finial; 2 bipartite windows to right and 1 bipartite window to left, transomed bipartite window in square-headed surround below finialled curvilinear gable to outer right and 2 similar windows also below curvilinear gable to outer left.

8-, 10- and 15-pane glazing patterns to tower and S centre and right at 1st and 2nd floor, plate glass glazing elsewhere, in timber top-opening and casement windows. Red tiles, coped ashlar stacks with cans, ashlar coped skews and finials. Cast-iron downpipes and decorative rainwater hoppers.

INTERIOR: PUBLIC-HOUSE: mosaic-patterned floor tiles to both entrances with bar interior retaining corniced panelling, part-glazed internal doors with decorative astragals and coloured glass, and inglenook with fluted pilasters surmounted by lions bearing shields, bench-seats and brick fireplace with beaten copper hood and (Delft?) tiles.

TENEMENT: stone stair with glazed tiles to dado height, decorative cast-iron balusters and timber handrail. Part-glazed and panelled doors with small-pane fanlights. No 269 retains decorative panelling to windows.

Statement of Interest

Built on site of East Port (1635-1825), the current building was (according to the FFP) built for Mr Adam Wilson with the copper dome fitted by Mr Louis Grant, plumber from Dundee. 3 sundials bear the wording: E facing - "I only count the sunny hours". SE facing - "I mark time. Dost thou"? S facing - "Time flies".

An illustration in ACADEMY ARCHITECTURE shows the 'Ingle Neuk' much as it remains but with one lion missing from this early picture.

External Links

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