Nunnykirk Hall

Nunnykirk Hall is a country house, now used as a school, built in 1825 by the architect John Dobson for William Orde. It is constructed of ashlar with a Lakeland slate roof and is designed in the Greek Revival style.

The entrance front is two storeys high with five broad bays. The central and outer bays project slightly. A large Ionic porte-cochere, featuring two columns in antis and a loggia of three pairs of Ionic columns, is centrally placed. The entire front is banded with rustication, forming voussoirs over the ground-floor openings. The windows are 12-pane and 6-pane sashes. A cornice with a parapet, featuring carved panels of scrolls, palmettes, and anthemia, tops the building. The roof is hipped.

A large, three-storey, six-bay service wing, forming an L-shape to the right, incorporates 30-pane sashes on the ground and first floors, and 16-pane sashes above.

The garden front consists of a three-storey, six-bay central section with projecting two-storey, one-bay wings. The central section mirrors the banded rustication of the entrance front, which is echoed in the angle pilasters of the wings. A single-storey loggia featuring four Ionic columns in antis is present. The ground floor is characterised by full-length 12-pane sashes, while the first floor has wood cross windows and the second floor has 6-pane sashes. A second-floor sill string, a palmette frieze, a dentil cornice, and a panelled parapet with scrolls complete the appearance. The projecting wings have full-length tripartite windows on the ground floor and shorter tripartite windows above. Scrolls and palmettes adorn the parapets. A large two-storey, three-bay bow window is situated on the south front.

The interior features a central hall with a coffered dome incorporating a glazed drum and rosettes. At each end of the hall are coffered segmental vaults with scrolled edges and a frieze depicting alternating palmettes and anthemia. A stone balcony with a cast-iron balustrade, featuring lion masks and a palmette frieze, is present. The staircase is semicircular, surrounding a screen of two Corinthian columns, and incorporates a frieze with Greek figures. The drawing room showcases a reticulated ceiling with floral intersections, a scrolled border, and a Greek key frieze, along with a white marble fireplace featuring a high-relief carving of an eagle and snake in the lintel, and a large gilded pelmet with an eagle. The dining room features a coffered ceiling, with each panel framed by palmettes and a frieze of palmettes and cornucopia. The library has shelves with Corinthian colonettes and an enriched cyma-moulded cornice. Excellent woodwork is throughout the principal rooms, with doors and shutters veneered in a variety of native and foreign woods.