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Summary

Description

John Alexander Carfrae, dated 1905. Symmetrical, 2-storey and basement to street with attic and garret, 10-bay, Scots-Renaissance former Roman Catholic school with Scandinavian-Jacobean influences. Polychromatic stonework and coped-crowstep gables. Red sandstone ashlar with intermittent use of pale dressings. Central gable with key-stoned roundel; stack at apex. Segmental-arched windows at 2nd floor. Slightly lower wings to E and W elevations with pilastered 'Boys' and 'Girls' entrance porches with concave leaded roofs. Steeply-pitched roof with small piended dormers to attic and garret levels; ornamental octagonal ventilator spirelet to centre of ridge. 4-storey to lower ground to rear. Balustraded parapet with pyramidal-cap finials to E and W corner angles. Low, chamfered boundary walls with cast-iron railings.

Variety of single and bipartite, small-paned timber sash and case windows. Later fixed-pane replacements to basement level. Slate roof. Banded end stacks with vertical ribbing. Clay cans. Cast-iron rainwater goods.

INTERIOR: Believed to be comprehensively refurbished for residential use. Stairs to E and W wings retained.

Statement of Special Interest

The former St Patrick's Roman Catholic School is a distinctive example of the Board School type utilising a polychromatic treatment which provides much interest to the streetscape. It is a good example of J A Carfrae's eclectic work. The building is particularly notable for its marked North European/Scandinavian character in the colourful stonework treatment and steeply pitched roof gables and attic and garret windows. Prominently situated, advancing right to the pavement line, it makes the most of the available site, allowing the maximum area for the former playground to the rear, now a car-park following the conversion of the building for residential use.

The Dictionary of Scottish Architects refers to Carfrae as 'one of the most brilliant architects of his generation although much of his work was constrained by standard board school formats'. His many renowned works, predominantly in the Queen Anne and neo-Jacobean style include the two Edinburgh Boroughmuir Schools and the Flora Stevenson School in Comely Bank (see separate listings).

List description updated at resurvey, 2007/08.

References

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