8-16 George Street, Oban

Dated 1891, 8-16 George Street is a three-storey and attic former hotel built in an asymmetrical Queen Anne style. The building has a rectangular plan and is constructed of sandstone ashlar for the principal and side elevations, with a rubble rear elevation accented by stugged dressings.

The George Street elevation presents seven bays. The ground floor features corniced and parapetted projecting shopfronts, with elements extending over a central loggia. Shop windows and entrances to the upper floors are set behind the ground floor shopfronts, with a central entrance to the shops. Canted bay windows are prominent at the first and second floors. An intermittent string course runs at the level of the first-floor lintels, and a cill course and cornice are found at the second-floor level, both extended around the bay windows. Gabled dormers break the eaves parapet above each bay, each featuring Dutch gables with semicircular open pediments at the apex and flanking finials. Modern shopfronts are present in the first two bays. An arched and architraved entrance doorway is centrally located within a five-bay loggia, with a keystone at the centre and an open pediment above. Flanking the doorway are square openings with supporting columns on high bases, behind which are round-arched, architraved windows, except for the doorway and the steps to the right. A chamfered corner is at the south end, surmounted by an open pediment. Canted bay windows are present at the first and second floors of bays 1, 3, and 5 and are capped with balustrades. Transomed, tripartite windows are set in bays 2 and 4 at the first, second, and third floors, while bipartite windows are in bays 6 and 7 at the first and second floors. A large dormer in bay 4 has three round-arched windows at the fourth-floor level, aligning with the tripartite windows below, and features a blind oval panel in the gablehead.

The rear elevation is characterized by a large flat-roofed ground-floor extension and regularly spaced windows, with transomed bipartite windows at the first floor. A broad, five-bay gable return of the principal elevation faces Stevenson Street. The ground floor has a shop window in bays 1 and 2, transomed windows in bays 3 and 4, and an architraved doorway with a round-arched fanlight above to the outer right. The upper floors are blank in bay 1, with transomed bipartite windows in the centre bay. The second floor features a pediment above the central window while the third floor has a bipartite window with a segmental-arched fanlight and a balustraded balcony supported by brackets. A datestone is set above the centre window of the third floor, within a moulded panel, with strip pilasters extending from the balcony to the chimney stack cornice. The cornice of the principal elevation is returned and stopped at a downpipe.

Timber sash and case windows are found on the west elevation, with plate glass lower sashes and nine-pane upper sashes. Some modern replacements are present at the first and second floors. The rear elevation has timber sash and case windows at the first floor with plate glass lower sashes and multi-pane sashes above, and two and four-pane timber sash and case windows elsewhere. The roof is covered in artificial grey slates, with ashlar stacks having small cornices and red cans, and moulded skew copes with kneeler points on the south elevation. Cast-iron downpipes with hoppers are visible on the west facade parapet. An illuminated pestle and mortar trade sign is located at the north end of the George Street elevation, and a cast-iron pillar-box is adjacent.