18 Queen's Road, Aberdeen

18 Queen's Road, Aberdeen, is an 1880 villa designed by Matthews and Mackenzie, with later additions and alterations. It is a two-storey building with a basement and attic, and originally had three bays. The building is constructed of tooled, coursed grey granite with contrasting light grey dressings, finely finished at the southeast (principal) elevation, while the remainder is Aberdeen bond granite rubble. The basement is rough-faced, with a base course, dividing band course, and a decorative eaves course. Decorative iron finials adorn the apex of the gables.

The southeast elevation is symmetrical. A broad, segmental-arched doorway, reached by stone steps flanked by iron railings, is centrally located on the ground floor, with an elaborately moulded lintel above a panelled timber door flanked by glazed panels and a fanlight. A gableted window breaks the eaves on the first floor above the doorway, with a skylight to the attic floor. Gabled bays flank the central bay on either side, with curved walls corbelled out to form an angle at the first floor. Canted windows extend through the basement and ground floors; the basement windows have a centre light enclosed by railings and are topped with part piended slate roofs surmounted by iron brattishing. Bipartite windows are positioned above on the first floor. Single-storey, single-bay wings are attached to the outer left and right, also gableted with segmental-arched doorways to the centre.

The northeast elevation has a gable and a flat-roofed ground floor addition with a single window above. An infill replaces an original bipartite window on the first floor. The northwest elevation exhibits predominantly irregular fenestration, featuring a fine stained-glass window off-centre on the first floor, flanked by piend-roofed windows breaking the eaves. A modern, broad dormer incorporating two windows is set into the attic floor. The southwest elevation is gabled and has a ground floor addition and a single window above on the first floor.

The windows are predominantly timber sash and case with two and four panes. Replacement timber windows with two panes and top hoppers are found on the ground floor of the southeast elevation. The slate roof has metal and felt ridges. Stone skews feature gableted and blocked skewputts. Coped gablehead stacks are topped with octagonal cans, and cast-iron rainwater goods are present.

The interior retains some original mouldings, panelled timber doors, architraves, skirting boards, and cornices. A tripartite inner door has fluted Ionic pilasters and glazed lights, and Ionic pilastered round-arched openings are present in the ground and first-floor halls. A dog-leg stair has turned timber balusters, and there’s an elaborate cornice in a room to the east of the ground floor, alongside panelling to window surrounds—with small colonettes at the angles.

Square-plan gatepiers with pyramidal caps mark the entrance on the southeast side, with low coped, rough-faced granite walls surmounted by modern railings in a traditional style between. Granite and brick coped rubble walls define the remainder of the boundary.