Description

John James Burnet, 1894-6, with later wing by H E Clifford. Single storey and attic, 7-bay symmetrical former hospital with Arts and Crafts influence. Roughcast walls with droved ashlar dressings. Raised ashlar margins with projecting window cills, cast-iron ventilators set in ashlar blocks.

S (WITCHBURN ROAD) ELEVATION: modern flat-roofed porch obscuring entrance door at centre bay. Cavetto-moulded lintel course over flanking bays interlocking with canted windows in 2nd and 6th bays. Tall windows in gables breaking eaves at outer bays. Battered buttresses at corners to outer left and right.

E AND W ELEVATIONS: 2-bay gable ends, door at left bay of W gable.

N (REAR) ELEVATION: 2-storey wing projecting at right angles from centre, 3-bay range intersecting at right angles with 3-bay upper floor elevation only exposed to N.

Glazing and doors currently obscured by boarding (1995), but appear to be modern aluminium units. Grey slate pitched roofs, overhanging eaves with timber boarded soffits and barge boards. Lead covered timber dormers over each bay at S pitch with curved roofs. Smaller dormer at centre with shallow curved roof. Cast-iron gutters and downpipes, those fronting buttresses with decorative hoppers. Roughcast stacks with profiled copes, single-flue at gables, 3-flue ridge stacks flanking centre 3 bays. 3-flue ridge stack to rear projection, single-flue at gables of single storey addition.

STEPS AND WALLS: ashlar steps opposite entrance, leading to lower drive. Symmetrically displaced lower flights from central platform with plain ashlar posts at corners, wrought-iron handrails with twisted and splayed newels at bottom step. Random rubble retaining wall with ashlar cope to E of steps, curving to S with drive. Random rubble boundary walls to E and W.

Statement of Interest

An illustration of 1896 shows the entrance door to have a columned doorpiece with a semicircular pediment breaking the eaves above. This is a low key building by an important architect resulting in a very subtle design. Details such as the partial eaves course visually connecting the windows to the entrance, and the downpipes on the buttresses, are the signs of a purposeful and skilled designer such as Burnet. The fact that this is an inexpensive building relative to his other designs gives this building added interest and importance.

External Links

• Historic Environment Scotland Listing
• Wikidata Q56648070

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

• 
  County Durham (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England) by Elizabeth Williamson Nikolaus Pevsner(1983-03-11)
• 
  Renovating Old Houses: Bringing New Life to Vintage Homes (For Pros By Pros)
• 
  Gloucestershire 1: The Cotswolds: Cotswolds Pt. 1 (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Dorset (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Historic Environment Law: Planning, Listed Buildings, Monuments, Conservation Areas and Objects by Harwood, Richard (2012) Paperback
• 
  Essex: Buildings of England Series (Buildings of England) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)