Description

Loch Lomond And Trossachs National Park Planning Authority

Blair Athol is a well-preserved example of a mid-19th century villa. The house, although relatively conventional in design, is well-detailed and a number of features such as the pilastered windows and the quatrefoil-pierced parapets are of interest. A 3-bay 1½-storey rectangular house with gabled half-dormer and ground-floor canted bays, Blair Athol also makes a significant contribution to the collection of buildings along the shore.

Built c1860, the villa has changed little since. The 3-bay front (E) elevation is symmetrical, with a central timber double door and a hood-mould. To either side of this are the canted bays, with quatrefoil-pierced stone parapets and pilastered mullions. The upper floor has 3 gabletted round-arched windows, the central one slightly lower. Each of the side elevations has 2 tall single windows on the ground floor. The rear of the house has 2 half-dormers and a single-storey projection. On the 1st edition map of c1863 there appears to be a small projection on the S of the rear wall, but by the map of c1898 this has been replaced with 2 parallel projections in the centre. Later, the area between the 2 pitch-roofed projections has been filled in with a flat-roofed block.

Interior: the interior contains a number of original features, including good plasterwork cornices and joinery.

Materials: painted ashlar to front elevation, rubble to sides and rear. Graded grey slate roof with stone stacks and polygonal clay cans. Concrete tiles to rear projection. Timber 2-leaf door. Timber sash and case windows, plate glass to the front and lying-pane to the rear.

Coach House And Boundary Walls: to the SW of the house is the rectangular-plan 2-storey rubble coach house. Although many features such as the doors and window remain to the side elevation, a low garage has been fixed to the front. The house is bounded by rubble walls, square-plan gatepiers have decorative pyramidal capstones.

Statement of Interest

The settlement of the W shore of Loch Long was a continuation from the development of Kilmun and Strone, which began in the late 1820s when marine engineer David Napier feued a three mile stretch of land from Campbell of Monzie and ran daily steamer connections to Glasgow. Blairmore pier opened in 1855, encouraging development northwards (Walker, 2000, 147).

External Links

• Historic Environment Scotland Listing
• Wikidata Q77778724

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

• 
  Old House Handbook: A Practical Guide to Care and Repair
• 
  This Old House: Restoring, Rehabilitating, and Renovating an Older House
• 
  Norfolk 1: Norwich and North-East: Norwich and North-east v. 1 (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  The green guide for historic buildings: how to improve the environmental performance of listed and historic buildings
• 
  Somerset: South and West (Pevsner Architectural Guides) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Cumbria: Cumberland, Westmorland and Furness (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)