Rankin House

Rankin House, originally a house and later used as a "Town Hall" and now offices, was built in the early 18th century and altered in the early 19th century. It is constructed of brick, with a stucco facade, and has a Welsh slate roof concealed behind a parapet. A 20th-century box dormer window punctuates the roof, and red brick chimney stacks are visible.

The front elevation was altered in the early 19th century, featuring a plinth, a plat band at first floor level, and a cornice. It has five sash windows on the first floor, set within shallow reveals and retaining their boxes and small panes. The ground floor has four long sash windows, also with exposed boxes and small-paned glazing. A central porch with four steps provides access, supported by Greek Ionic columns, Tuscan Doric responds, and a detailed entablature with a fascia, frieze, cornice and blocking course. A four-panelled door, topped with a fanlight featuring pointed, arched glazing bars, is set within a reveal below the porch. The rear elevation is plainer, with stucco and plat bands at first and second floor levels, five sash windows with glazing bars on the first and second floors, and an altered ground floor featuring linked mullion and transom casements. There is a central half-glazed door.

The interior follows a double-pile plan, comprising four rooms arranged around a narrow hall. The early 18th-century newel staircase has square newels with recessed panels and bolection moulding, capped with a cyma reversa, and sweeping moulded handrails. Column-on-vase balusters and a heavy moulded close string are also present. A dado with a moulded cap and raised fielded panels, along with pilasters topped with honeysuckle caps, is complemented by heavily moulded fruit and flowers over an arched niche on the ground floor. The entrance hall is decorated with bands of Vitruvian scroll moulding and arches supported on moulded consoles.

From 1867, the building functioned as a privately run "Town Hall," administered by a syndicate of local businessmen, and a meeting room was added behind it; this was demolished in the 1950s.