Campbell House, The Crichton

Campbell House is a villa built between 1841 and 1842 by William McGowan, and remodelled and extended in 1888 by William Moir. It is a roughly square building with projecting wings, set on a basement, and has a piended roof. The exterior is of red sandstone ashlar with polished ashlar dressings, featuring a ground floor cill course, eaves cornice, and blocking course. The windows are irregular, incorporating single, bipartite, and tripartite arrangements with stone mullions and some transoms; corniced window margins are present at both ground and first floor levels. The east elevation, the main façade, is stepped, with a slightly advanced central bay featuring a large tripartite window. A handsome balustraded porch with a pilastered arched entrance and urn finials projects from the re-entrant angle to the left. The south elevation is regularly fenestrated, with a large 4-light canted window extending through all floors. The north elevation is irregularly fenestrated, with an advanced bay to the right featuring a tripartite window and a scrolled pediment above. The rear (west) elevation is also regularly fenestrated, with an advanced two-bay section to the left. Plate glass is set in timber sash and case windows, topped by a grey slate roof and cast-iron rainwater goods.

The interior is remarkably well preserved and of high quality, showcasing late 19th-century joinery. The porch features a two-leaf timber panelled storm door, a half-glazed inner door with bevelled glass, and encaustic tiles with a Roman Catholic monogram in quatrefoil motifs. The entrance hall has ¾ height timber panelling and a screen separating the inner and outer halls, featuring a carved depressed arch with stained glass. Other interior features include decorative plasterwork, a timber staircase with turned balusters and a carved newel post, ornate carved timber chimney pieces to the principal ground floor rooms, some with tiled insets and cast-iron grate doors, and half panelling in some ground floor rooms. First floor bedrooms have chimneypieces and roll-moulded cornicing. A fine Art Deco bathroom on the first floor retains its original green lino, basin, bath, shower, towel rail, green tiles with cream and black border, a stepped mirror, and three hooks on the door. A pierced ashlar balustrade extends north from the entrance on the east elevation.