Description
Andrew Heiton, junior, dated 1868; large Baronial mansion in Bryce manner. Picturesque, asymmetrical elevations, mainly 2-storey, with dormer-headed windows breaking parapets, and partial basement to N and E. Vigorous bull-faced squared sandstone masonry to main elevations, with polished ashlar dressings, crowstepped skews and beaked skewputts. Boldly profiled roof-line with conical roofed angle bartizans, crowstepped gables. Square-plan tower with pitched-roof caphouse at centre on S front. Single-storey service wings projecting at N, arched gateway and screen walls enclosing service court to N. Single rectangular and arched windows, and mullioned and transomed windows with multi-pane sash and case glazing, ground floor glazing replaced after 1919, with smaller, Edwardian panes. Slated roof, with lead flashings and finials and masonry ball finials. W (ENTRANCE) ELEVATION: 4 asymmetrical bays, 2-storey with parapet, bartizans corbelled out over angles; entrance in projecting 2-storey and attic gabled bay, with rounded angles at ground floor, corbelled to square at 1st floor, and with crowstepped gablehead; segmental-arched doorpiece with vigorous bolection and nail-head moulding, moulded string carried round square heraldic sculpture panel over; recessed 2-leaf doors (altered); paired windows at 1st floor above, wall-plane slightly jetted over stepped string-course over, paired arched lights at attic with stilted-arched blind tympanums in gablehead; turret in SW re-entrant angle to right, corbelled from 1st floor as quarter-circle plan, then corbelled to square at attic, with tall pyramidal slated roof. 2 bays set back to right with single mullioned and transomed projecting window at ground over centre of bay, 2 single-light windows at 1st floor, dormer-headed attic window with triangular pediment breaking parapet over centre. 2 bays of single-storey, and single-storey and loft service wings slightly recessed to left; raggle line of demolished conservatory over gabled end bay. N (SERVICE COURT) ELEVATION: crowstepped end gables of main N-S blocks; centre bay with triple-arched stair window, reglazed with modern obscured glass; decorative leaded glazing to 1st floor window at far left-hand bay.
E ELEVATION: 4-bay main block to left, a shallow L-plan with 2 set-back bays to left, with 6-light mullioned and transomed projecting window bay at ground/basement, and 2 small widely-spaced windows at 1st and attic, attic windows with triangle pediments and finials flanking attached wallhead chimney; projecting 2-storey, attic and basement circular tower to right, off-centre; full-height (2-storey, basement and attic) narrow crowstep-gabled bay linked at right. Single-storey and basement subsidiary block with rounded SE angle, corbelled at wallhead over, left-hand skewputt at lower level right, giving asymmetrical gablehead. Crenellated walls of TERRACING to E.
S ELEVATION: 5-bay, 2-storey, and 2-storey and attic; advanced and recessed wall-planes, with symmetrical canted projecting window bays clasping to right and left, corbelled to square half-way up attic storey, and with crowstepped gables; segmental-arched tympana of 1st floor windows incised with geometrical star and flower motifs; 4-stage square-plan tower with crowstep-gabled cap-house off-centre to left, with rounded angles at ground, corbelled to square at 1st, 2nd and 3rd stages; fine shallow 3-light oriel corbelled at 2nd storey (2nd and 3rd stage containing 2 shorter floors), windows divided by mannered pilasters with stilted polygonal heads, bead moulding in caps, curved sash and case windows, oriel merges above with elaborate corbelling at machicolated and crenellated parapet, cap-house set-back above. 2 plainer bays recessed off-centre to right, crenellated parapet at wallhead. INTERIOR: mostly stripped of original interior scheme, but retaining, in central great hall, some post-War reinstatement work, possibly by Andrew Grainger Heighton (nephew of Andrew Heiton, jnr), with: dog-leg stair with timber staircase with turned balusters; Roman Doric columned screen in hall at ground, capitals with canted volutes; three-quarter height wainscot in hall mostly lost, but partially surviving at fire-place projection; segmental-arched, bolection-moulded Jacobethan chimney-piece, of polished ashlar, and similar, broader segmental-arched Jacobethan bolection-moulded chimney-piece in drawing room.