Description

Sir Robert Rowand Anderson, 1876. Additions 1878, 1935 by George Sandilands and 1989 single storey link to W by Fife Region Architect. Single storey and attic, 11-bay (grouped 1-4-1-4-1) gothic school. Bull-faced squared and snecked rubble with ashlar dressings, harled extension. Ashlar base course on rock-faced rubble bed, string courses in gableheads. Pointed-arch and shouldered openings, plate tracery; 2-stage buttresses, relieving arches, voussoirs and hoodmoulds with label-stops; chamfered reveals, stone transoms and mullions.

N (PRINCIPAL) ELEVATION: symmetrical. Hoodmoulded, transomed bipartite window to centre bay with carved animal detail to blind, cusped tri-lobed windowheads in pointed-arch openings and circular moulding with carved foliage and phoenix, the whole giving appearance of plate tracery; string course and small raised-centre triple loop in low gablehead, finialled, timber-louvered fleche with slate-hung aprons to roof-ridge above. 4 bipartite windows to right of centre with small slate-hung, timber louvered dormer vent above in steeply-pitched roof. Broad, advanced gabled bay to outer right with 2 bipartite windows high up in hoodmoulded outer framing with floreate detail to tri-lobed window heads in pointed-arch openings with small animal head at springing point; whole flanking 1st stage of coped buttress, 2nd stage extending to string course below triple loop and further string course above in gablehead; further bipartite window on return to left. Bays to left of centre mirror those to right.

E ELEVATION: 5-bay with later pitch-roofed extension and flat-roofed porch to outer left. Centre bay with slightly advanced, full-height chimney breast, coped and raked above eaves line to base of tall rounded stack. 2 bipartite windows to flanking bays.

W ELEVATION: 5 bays mirror those to E elevation; 1989 single storey extension to outer right with asymmetrical fenestration and main entrance in small gable to left of centre.

S ELEVATION: elevation faces enclosed courtyard playground with piended wing to right of centre, and 1989 link to left. Attic of gables to outer right and left each with tripartite window, pointed relieving arch and single loop in gablehead; 2 timber-louvered dormer air vents as N elevation. S perimeter of courtyard with gabled, rubble building to centre, 1935 harled extension to E and 1989 extension to W.

SW BLOCK: irregular L-plan; N and E elevations overlook enclosed courtyard playground with outbuilding (see below) to E.

W (METHVEN ROAD) ELEVATION: advanced, broad gable with transomed tripartite, plate traceried window with hoodmould and single loop in gablehead; smaller, pitch-roofed bay in re-entrant angle to right with bipartite window and blinded door on return to right, and polygonal ridge stack; 3 bipartite windows to right on recessed face.

S (WILLIAM STREET) ELEVATION: broad gable to left with 2 hoodmoulded, transomed, bipartite plate-traceried windows and decorative, hoodmoulded oculus in gablehead; 6 bipartite windows in recessed face to right.

Small-pane glazing patterns in top-opening timber windows. Graded grey slates. Coped ashlar stacks and ashlar-coped stepped skews; cast-iron downpipes with decorative rainwater hoppers and fixings.

INTERIOR: largely modernised but some boarded dados retained. Hall to N block with open beam roof, stepped dado (see Notes), and elliptical- arched openings. Hall to S with traceried windows, open beam ceiling and corbelled brackets. Some original window-openings mechanisms.

OUTBUILDING: slated outbuilding with brick wall to W and pitched-roof to E on supporting cast-iron columns; modern extensions abutting to N and S.

GATEPIERS, BOUNDARY WALLS AND LAMP BRACKET: stop-chamfered, coped ashlar gatepiers; low saddleback-coped boundary walls, some with railings, and coped rubble boundary walls. Decorative cast-iron lamp bracket to NE boundary.

Statement of Interest

Floor of N Hall formerly raked, hence stepped dado. An unusually good and complete example of an early board school. The janitor's house (No 44) and former schoolmaster's house (No 40) are listed separately.

External Links

• Historic Environment Scotland Listing
• Wikidata Q17807707

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

• 
  Sussex: East with Brighton and Hove (Buildings of England) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Devon (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Kent: West and the Weald: The Buildings of England (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  [(Cumberland and Westmorland)] [By (author) Nikolaus Pevsner] published on (January, 1967)
• 
  Old House Care and Repair
• 
  Suffolk: East (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)