Community Centre, Ann Street, Stonehaven

The building is a community centre, located on a raised corner site at Ann Street, Stonehaven. It was originally a school, constructed in 1875 by J Russell Mackenzie. The building is a single and two-storey, five-bay structure following an E-plan, and is built in a Gothic style, featuring finialled gables, a quatrefoil-panelled parapet, dated decorative rainwater hoppers, and some good interior detail. The exterior is constructed of coursed squared rubble with ashlar dressings, two courses deep, and stugged quoins. It incorporates base, band, and eaves courses.

The east (principal) elevation, facing Ann Street, is symmetrical with prominent advanced outer gables. The central bay at ground level has a shoulder-arched doorway featuring a corniced door with a blocked fanlight and flanking narrow lights. The remaining bays at each floor have regular fenestration. The first-floor windows in the three centre bays have taller shoulder-arched centre lights rising into pointed-arch panels within dormer gablets. An overarch recess embraces all three lights at the outer gables. Stone mullions, chamfered arrises, and raked cills are present throughout, as are wide-centre tripartite windows.

The west (Robert Street) elevation is plainer and symmetrical, single-storey, and also follows an E-plan. Access is at a first-floor level. The advanced outer gables each feature a raised central tripartite window. A door is positioned in the right return of the left gable, and a window in the left return of the right gable. The lower central gable has a bipartite window flanked by small gabletted porches and narrow lights.

The north and south elevations are affected by a steeply sloping ground falling towards the east, resulting in single-storey bays to the west and two-storey bays to the east.

The majority of the windows contain four-pane and plate glass glazing patterns, set within timber sash and case frames. Grey slates cover the roof, with original vertically-astragalled horizontal rooflights to the west side. Coped ashlar ridge stacks, ashlar-coped skewputts with moulded skewputts, and stone finials are also present. Cast-iron downpipes incorporate decorative rainwater hoppers bearing the date.

The interior features moulded cornices, pointed-arch openings, panelled timber doors (some corniced), vertically-boarded timber dadoes, a dog-leg staircase with decorative cast-iron balusters, a pilastered hall on the first floor, and first-floor rooms to the north and south each with a hammerbeam roof.

A slated, piended rubble ancillary building is situated at the northwest corner of the car park, previously used as a playground. It has three horizontal blocked window openings to the north, a timber door to the east, a flat-roofed extension to the south, and a large louvered ridge ventilator.

Extensive coped rubble boundary walls enclose the site.