Rankine House And Gatepiers, 21 Hallhead Road, Edinburgh

Rankine House and Gatepiers is a 2-storey near T-plan Arts and Crafts house designed by Arthur Balfour Paul in 1923. The building is constructed of squared and snecked rubble with polished ashlar dressings and some brick window surrounds, featuring an eaves course, irregular quoins, and margins.

The northwest elevation, which serves as the entrance, has a studded boarded timber door with a recessed rectangular stone plaque above it, topped by a single window that breaks the eaves in a curvilinear gable. To the right of the entrance, there is a corniced stack that rises to the full height of the building, breaking the eaves. To the left of the entrance bay, a large stair window is located on the first floor, followed by a bipartite window with a stone mullion on the ground floor and a pedimented single window above it on the first floor, which also breaks the eaves. Further left, there is a tripartite window with stone mullions on the ground floor and a single window above it on the first floor. A piend-roofed single storey wing extends to the outer left, featuring three single windows that clasp the angle, with a single window to the first floor of the main block behind.

The southwest elevation includes a gabled bay on the left with decorative curvilinear coping that extends down to the ground floor level on the right side. This elevation features a canted 4-light window with stone mullions on the ground floor, two single windows on the first floor above, and a single window to the ground on the outer right of the gabled bay. To the right, there is a tripartite mullioned window on the ground floor and two single windows that break the eaves in the gable head on the first floor.

The house showcases a variety of small-pane glazing patterns, including 15- and 20-pane timber sash and case windows. The roof is covered with grey slate and features five corniced and chamfered stacks, with three having pairs of cans, one with three cans, and one with four. Scrolled skewputts and cast-iron rainwater goods are also present.

The gates, gatepiers, and boundary walls consist of coped rubble boundary walls along Hallhead Road and Mayfield Road, with stone gatepiers that support boarded timber gates leading to Hallhead Road. The interior was not seen in 1996.