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Summary

Description

Dated 1878. 3-storey plus attic storey, 3-bay, symmetrical block comprising shops at ground floor and offices and tenement above, with bowed centre bay at 1st and 2nd floors, gabled dormers, rich Gothic detailing and mansard roof, forming part of terrace. Smooth render to front; squared, roughly coursed yellow sandstone with polished ashlar dressings and raised cills to rear. Partial base course; fascia cornice; 1st- and 2nd-floor cill courses; continuous hoodmould and lintel course to 1st floor; eaves course rising to corbelled cornice. Foliate capitals to pilaster quoins. Predominantly basket-arched windows, bipartite to 1st and 2nd floors and central dormer, with slender, foliate-capitalled columns to stop-chamfered mullions and margins. Central, 6-panel timber door with semicircular fanlight, with deeply projecting keystone supporting bowed section above (see NOTES), flanked by engaged columns with octagonal bases and foliate capitals. Richly carved eaves corbels and dormer gables (see NOTES).

Plate glass at ground floor; timber sash and case windows above, with plate glass to central bay, curved at 1st and 2nd floors, and 4-pane glazing to outer bays; 4-pane glazing in timber sash and case windows to rear. Grey slate roof. Ashlar-coped, kneelered skews. Coped ashlar stacks with predominantly octagonal buff clay cans.

INTERIOR: Stone stair to close, with polished timber handrail, and decorative cast-iron balustrade to top storey. 1st floor with 4-panel timber doors, some tongue-and-groove panelling around windows, plain cornices, and identical painted timber chimneypieces in each room with chamfering and console details.

Statement of Special Interest

B-Group comprises Nos 77, 79, 81, 83 and 85 High Street and 3 and 4 Oliver Place - see separate list entries.

An imposing, symmetrical, later-19th-century block with fine Gothic-inspired detailing and distinctive, bowed central section, situated at the later, north end of Hawick's High Street and making a strong contribution to the streetscape.

Oliver Place was built under the patronage of James Oliver of Thornwood (1817-1905), who made his fortune in the auctioneering business and was one of the town's wealthiest and most prominent figures at the time. The carved head on the projecting keystone/corbel above the central doorway may be a representation of him. His monogram 'JRO' (his middle name was Rutherford) appears in both of the outer dormers, each of which is crowned by sculptures of pairs of seated grotesque animals. Among the other carved features are the pediment of the central dormer, which displays a dragon amid foliage; the lion standing atop the same dormer bearing a shield with the date 1878; and the eaves corbels, which display a range of motifs including foliate forms, 'green men' and an owl.

Oliver funded construction of a number of buildings in Hawick, including his home, the vast villa of Thornwood (now Mansfield House Hotel), designed by the prominent Edinburgh-born but Glasgow-based architect John Thomas Rochead (1814-78) in 1868-70, and the Buccleuch Hotel in Trinity Street, designed by local architect Michael Brodie in 1882. Unfortunately the architect of 3 Oliver Place is not known, but it could be one of these men; the quality of the architecture suggest a designer of national rather than purely local standing, although Rochead had retired in the early 1870s and so it seems unlikely that it was his work.

During the Second World War, the first floor was occupied by the Agriculture and Food Office. It is now the premises of a firm of solicitors, whilst the upper floors contain two private apartments, each occupying two storeys - one to the left, the other to the right.

This block was previously listed as one item with 83-85 High Street and 4 Oliver Place. It is referred to on maps as Nos 1, 2 and 3 Oliver Place, but all premises in the building are addressed as No 3. It therefore seems likely that Nos 81-85 High Street were originally Nos 1 and 2 Oliver Place; their similarity to No 4 also bears out this theory. List description revised following resurvey (2008).

References

Bibliography

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