Gate Lodge, Ratho Hall, Edinburgh

The Gate Lodge at Ratho Hall in Edinburgh dates from the earlier 19th century. It is a two-storey building with the first floor accessed from rising ground to the west, built into a boundary wall and seemingly raised from a single storey. The lodge has a cruciform plan and features squared, coursed whinstone for the principal floor, rubble for the basement, and sandstone dressings with droved margins and quoins. There is an eaves band and a band course.

On the west elevation, which is the former main elevation on higher ground, there is a portico supported by Doric piers and pilasters, with a window at the center where a door used to be. A low rubble boundary wall runs to the left, with an ashlar gate pier built into the left corner, and a modern flat-roofed addition to the right.

The north elevation has a single window and the recessed returns of the west and east elevations. The south elevation features a central projecting bay with windows at both the ground and first floors, as well as a window at the ground level in the right return and a modern addition to the outer right.

The east elevation is two-storey, with the boundary wall into which the lodge was built running to the right. The coping continues as a band course to the house when it was raised to two-storey. There are later windows at both the ground and first floors, and a door in the boundary wall to the right.

The building has 12-pane uPVC windows, a grey slate piend and platform roof, and truncated stacks at the center of the roof. It features overhanging timber eaves and moulded guttering that acts as a cornice.

The boundary wall and gate piers consist of rough rubble and pointing, similar to the basement of the main house, and the wall curves to a sandstone ashlar pier at the upper level. There is a rubble pier at the ground level to the north, and the wall continues in a curve to the west with a coursed whinstone parapet that has a sandstone string course and coping.