40 Queen's Road, Aberdeen

A double villa, built in 1884 by Matthews and Mackenzie, situated at 40 Queen’s Road, Aberdeen. The building is two storeys and has an attic, comprising two semi-detached villas mirrored on either side. The south-east (principal) elevation features finely finished, tooled, grey granite margins, while the rest of the exterior is Aberdeen bond rubble. A rough-faced granite base course runs along the bottom, and architraved surrounds the windows on the main elevation. A dividing string course also acts as the cill course for the first-floor windows. Gabletted dormers are set into the roof, featuring pierced bargeboards.

The south-east elevation is nearly symmetrical and consists of four bays, with two two-bay villas reflected on either side. Two panelled timber doors, each with a two-leaf design, are centrally located on the ground floor of the middle two bays. Each door is topped with an architraved fanlight flanked by scrolls. Regular sash windows are present on the first floor, and two dormers are in the attic. Rectangular, tripartite windows in rough-faced granite are in the ground and first floors of the bays on the far left and right. Dutch gables break the eaves, with ogee mouldings on the steps and tiered string courses flanking a central round-arched window featuring a keystone. Diminutive pediments crown the round-arched windows, and each gable has a roundel at its apex. Curved angles are present on the left and right; the right-hand curve forms a tower, and a window is centred on the ground, first, and attic floors. This tower has a conical turret roof covered with fishscale slate and topped with an iron finial.

The north-east elevation is gabled, with two windows to the right of the first floor, and a single round-arched window centred in the gablehead. A two-storey wing extends to the far right. The north-west elevation is partially obscured by gabled bays, has irregular window placement, and features a single-storey gabled bay jutting outwards in the centre of the ground floor. The south-west elevation is also gabled, with a pair of windows on the left of the first floor and a round-arched window centred in the gablehead.

Most of the windows are timber sash and case windows, with two panes per sash. Some ground-floor windows in number 40 have been replaced with timber windows incorporating top hoppers. The roof is covered in grey slate with lead ridges. Corniced gablehead stacks rise from the roof, along with a stack that breaks the roof’s pitch and is topped with circular cans. Cast-iron rainwater goods are present.

The interior has been remodelled, but number 42 Queen’s Road retains its original arcaded timber screen and tapered Ionic columns creating a porch and hall, as well as a staircase with turned timber balusters.

The property is fronted by square-plan granite ashlar gate piers, topped with pyramidal caps. A gate pier on the west side is shared with the adjacent property. Low, coped granite walls run alongside, with granite and brick coped rubble walls forming the remainder of the boundary.