South Colleonard House

South Colleonard House is a tall Italianate villa built around 1870 by George Wilson Murray, closely following a design for Oakleigh Villa by John Gordon published in Villa and Cottage Architecture. The house stands on a steeply sloping south-east facing site.

The building is two storeys with an attic storey above a raised battered basement, arranged in a rough L-plan. The south re-entrant angle was infilled in the early 20th century with glazed conservatories. The walls are white harled with self-coloured painted ashlar dressings.

The main entrance is positioned on the south-west front, accessed by steps leading to a square corniced ashlar porch with slender pilasters and a round-arched entrance door. The glazed conservatories infilling the re-entrant angle occupy the raised ground floor and first floor, featuring original cast-iron glazing bars with mask decoration on the ground floor, though the roofs have been renewed. The attic storey forms a single view-room served by a tall, slender square Italianate campanile-like stair tower, with the principal staircase lit by a round-headed three-light arcade.

The south-east elevation features a shallow bowed bay containing the ground floor dining room and drawing room above. The dining room has a four-light square-headed window; the drawing room above has four-light round-headed windows with blocked imposts. A pair of oculi sits below a tall round-arched stair window in a taller bay to the left, with a two-light arcade serving the attic. Similar detailed windows of single, two and three-lights appear on the first floor of the south-east and south-west elevations. The rear and north-east elevations have plain fenestration.

A single-storey three-bay service wing extends to the north-east, with small round-headed windows. The shallow slate roofs have deep plate glass eaves with exposed rafters and end and ridge chimney stacks. An ornamental urn with anthemion and decorative detailing crowns the chimney stack above the attic room as an apex finial, with tall hand-thrown chimney cans elsewhere. A decorative cast-iron apex finial marks the south-west gable.

The windows throughout are predominantly timber sash and case, though the dining room has modern replacements.

Interior: The entrance porch is floored with coloured encaustic tiles and leads to an entrance and stair hall. The dining room retains its original wooden chimneypiece and deep plaster ceiling frieze with a centre ceiling rose decorated with oak-leaf detailing. The staircase has original wooden balusters leading to the first-floor landing and drawing room. The drawing room displays a decorative plaster frieze and white marble chimneypiece, with decorative cast-iron detailing to the window frames; the outer reveals of the bowed bay are faced with bevelled mirror. A cast-iron spiral stair winds through the tower to serve the attic view-room, with the upper portion of the tower constructed of bolted iron plates. The basement contains a former laundry where a stove for heating flat irons survives as a fitting.

The property is notable for its Italianate design and its precise adherence to Gordon's design throughout the interior. Of particular interest is the structural incorporation of cast-iron components, clearly reflecting the owner-builder's profession in the foundry industry.

George Wilson Murray originated from New Pitsligo, Aberdeenshire, and spent time in Australia working as a builder and entrepreneur. He purchased the Banff Foundry in spring 1863 and operated it successfully until his death in June 1887, aged 53. He married in September 1863 and had two daughters. Murray developed and invented agricultural machinery which he exhibited and sold internationally. The exact date of his move to South Colleonard is unknown; he leased the property and constructed his house on a slope below the existing farm.

The listing includes decorative shallow urns on corniced dies positioned at the head of the entrance steps. The gates and gatepiers comprise two-leaf decorative cast and wrought-iron gates hung on panelled square-section gatepiers with pyramidal caps.