178-180, MAIN STREET

A pair of semi-detached houses built in the 1880s by William Wilson, a local architect, builder and funerary sculptor. They are constructed in pink and grey local sandstone, with grey slate roofs. The stonework is roughly shaped and coursed to the rear and left return, while the front and right return are coursed with ashlar and decorated with 'fish-scale' rustication.

Each house is a mirror image of the other, comprising three storeys plus a semi-basement. They have enclosed front porches, halls with staircases, front and back reception rooms, and single storey extensions across the rear.

The front elevation is highly decorative. Four 2-over-4 vertical sash windows are set evenly across the first floor with ashlar dressings, each topped by a different carved head in the centre of the lintel. A central single storey enclosed porch has doors facing to the sides and is approached by curved stone steps. The entrances are round-arched with prominent keystones and panelled half-glazed doors with semi-circular overlights. Two round-arched windows facing the front are set in plain engaged columns with Ionic capitals. Columns rise from ground to roof at each corner and in the centre, supporting an entablature with a deeply carved frieze of swags, dentils and cornice. Above each column stands a free-standing bust: a central figure of Alexander the Great flanked by heads purportedly of Robert Burns and Walter Scott. Ground floor windows to each side are two-light 2-over-4 sashes with segmental arch tops, set in narrow pilasters with console brackets supporting a narrow projecting cornice. A dentilled string course runs at first floor level; the second floor string course is plain. Four second floor windows are lucarnes with semi-circular heads and carved, scrolled architraves. Four carved eagles stand free-standing at the corners of the hipped roof. The stonework throughout, except for quoins, window dressings and the second floor, is heavily incised with fish-scale patterning. Basement windows with plain stone surrounds are visible beside the front steps and continue to each side.

The right return displays the same string courses and fish-scale patterning as the front. It has four ground floor and four first floor windows similar to those on the front, each lintel topped with an individually carved head. The second floor windows match the front second floor type and are positioned either side of two large ashlar chimney stacks with dentilled cornices. The left return is plainer, with the same number of windows on each floor but only the second floor windows having carved and scrolled architraves; the remainder have plain dressings. This side, and the rear, show roughly coursed and shaped stonework. At ground floor to the rear, two single storey extensions with hipped slate roofs and rendered glazed walls occupy the full width. The original back wall retains four 2-over-4 sash windows at varying heights and two smaller windows at second floor level. Both houses have a single roof light to the rear.

The left-hand house (No. 180) retains significant original interior features. The front door opens into a porch with deep decorative coving of alternating lion heads and consoles. A round-headed archway leads to the hall, which has similar coving and a door to the main reception room. A curving dog-leg staircase with decorative cast iron balusters and wooden handrail is reached beyond another archway. The corridor continues left of the stair towards the rear reception room and stairs descending to the basement, which have plain stick balusters. The front room contains window shutters, original skirting boards, a timber fireplace surround, and elaborate plasterwork ceiling rose and cornicing with an individual floral frieze above a modified egg-and-dart pattern. The rear reception room is plainer but retains cornices, skirtings and shutters. A former rear window has been altered to form a doorway to a 21st-century rear extension with open roof structure, roof lights, windows and a side exterior door. The basement is subdivided into several rooms with windows to exterior light wells. Three first floor bedrooms survive, two with highly decorative cornicing and elaborate ceiling roses. The stairs to the second floor have plainer cast iron balusters. Three second floor bedrooms, partly within the roof, have arched and angled window openings.

The right-hand house (No. 178) mirrors the left but has fewer original doors, shutters and skirtings, and original fireplaces do not survive; there is also some alteration to first floor layout. A circular plasterwork plaque in the front porch, said to be a copy of a continental original, depicts a female figure with a cherub in classical style.

William Wilson is said to have built No. 178 for himself and to have sold No. 180 to fund it, though this claim is also made of Wilson Terrace further down Main Street, built in 1878. The houses have undergone some internal losses, and outbuildings to the rear of No. 178 (storerooms and privies) have been demolished. Apart from a single storey extension to the rear of each, they remain largely unaltered. A garage built on the former outbuilding site at No. 178 extends to the rear side of the house.

The pair faces Main Street on ground that rises steeply to the rear.