Description

David Bryce, 1873; completed 1877 by John Bryce. 2-storey and attic, crowstep gabled court house in asymmetrical, plain Scots Baronial style with former prison, warden's house and police station wing adjoining to rear. The flat-roofed garage extension to south is not considered of special interest in listing terms at time of review.

Principal elevation to north is of stugged and coursed sandstone ashlar with polished dressings. Advanced entrance bay offset to left of centre with steps to moulded doorpiece with carved panel (dated 1877). Corbelled out above with gable head stack. Gabletted windows with rose-finials breaking eaves to right. Three salvaged 16th century tablets, two with the arms of Bishop Robert Reid and one with the arms of Bishop Edward Stewart, are set in the east and west gable heads.

Former prison/police office adjoins to west with a conical-roofed stair tower in the re-entrant angle. 2-storey, 5-bay block of squared and snecked sandstone rubble with chamfered reveals, long and short quoins, and corniced eaves course. Stone steps to entrance. Gabletted first floor windows with rose and thistle finial. 6-bay elevation to south with horizontal windows (former cells). Walled former exercise courtyard adjoins to east elevation.

The interior of the court house, seen 2014, has plain cornicing to hall and a plastered barrel vaulted ceiling to courtroom.

4-pane glazing in timber sash and case windows to court house. Predominantly 12-pane glazing in timber sash and case windows to former prison/police offices. Grey slate roofs with stone ridges and stone skews. Predominantly cast iron rainwater goods.

Low rubble boundary walls with ridged ashlar cope along Palace Road and Watergate Street. Square-plan ashlar gatepiers with pyramidal caps to Palace Road entrance with spear-headed cast iron railings.

Statement of Interest

Kirkwall Sheriff Court including former prison/police station is an important civic building in its local setting and a rare surviving example of a combined prison and court house, which was built at the tail-end of the first wave of court house building following the Sheriff Court Houses (Scotland) Act of 1860. The building is a late work of the eminent Scottish architect David Bryce (1803-1876) in a modest Baronial style and was completed by his nephew, John, in 1877 with some proposed features including a tower and attic storey omitted from the final design. On completion in 1877, the Kirkwall Court House was described in the Orkney Herald as being in 'the old Scottish style with slight ornamentation'.

In 1860 David Bryce was commissioned to survey the remains of Earl Patrick's Palace (Scheduled Monument) to the south of St. Magnus Cathedral, with a view to restoring it to function as the town hall and court house. The plan was eventually shelved due to a combination of factors including expense and prison authority concerns regarding the housing of a new prison within an old building. Plans for a new court house building in the grounds of the Earl's Palace were put forward by Bryce around 1873.

Bryce died on May 7th 1876 and his nephew, John Bryce, took over the commission. The building was opened on 27 August 1877. The building has more recently been refurbished with the former police office and prison block currently (2015) in use as a dental practice.

The development of the court house as a building type in Scotland follows the history of the Scottish legal system and wider government reforms. The majority of purpose-built court houses were constructed in the 19th century as by this time there was an increase in the separation of civic, administrative and penal functions into separate civic and institutional buildings, and the resultant surge of public building was promoted by new institutional bodies. The introduction of the Sheriff Court Houses (Scotland) Act of 1860 gave a major impetus to the increase and improvement of court accommodation and the provision of central funding was followed by the most active period of sheriff court house construction in the history of the Scottish legal system, and many new court houses were built or reworked after this date.

Court houses constructed after 1860 generally had a solely legal purpose and did not incorporate a prison, other than temporary holding cells. Exceptions to this were the more remote island locations including Kirkwall; Lochmaddy, North Uist; Stornoway in the Western Isles and Tobermory, Mull (see separate listings). The courts were designed in a variety of architectural styles but often relied heavily on Scots Baronial features to reference the fortified Scottish building tradition. Newly constructed court buildings in the second half of the 19th century dispensed with large public spaces such as county halls and instead provided bespoke office accommodation for the sheriff, judge and clerks, and accommodated the numerous types of court and holding cells.

The flat-roofed garage addition to the south is not considered of special interest in listing terms at the time of the review (2014-15).

Category changed from B to C, statutory address and listed building record revised as part of the Scottish Courts Listing Review, 2014-15. Previously listed as 'Watergate, Sheriff Court And Police Station, Including Boundary Walls, Gatepiers And Railings'.

External Links

• Historic Environment Scotland Listing
• Kirkwall Sheriff Court and Former Police Station, Watergate at Wikipedia
• Wikidata Q17827907

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

• 
  Maintaining and Repairing Old Houses: A Guide to Conservation, Sustainability and Economy
• 
  Kent: North East and East (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  County Durham (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England) by Elizabeth Williamson Nikolaus Pevsner(1983-03-11)
• 
  Somerset: South and West (Pevsner Architectural Guides) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Historic Environment Law: Planning, Listed Buildings, Monuments, Conservation Areas and Objects by Harwood, Richard (2012) Paperback
• 
  Staffordshire (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)