Yester Chapel (Formerly St Cuthbert's Collegiate Church), Yester House, Gifford is a Grade A listed building in the East Lothian local planning authority area, Scotland. First listed on 5 February 1971. Chapel.

Yester Chapel (Formerly St Cuthbert's Collegiate Church), Yester House, Gifford

WRENN ID
secret-span-moss
Grade
A
Local Planning Authority
East Lothian
Constituency
Lothian East MP: Mr Douglas Alexander (Lab)
Country
Scotland
Date first listed
5 February 1971
Type
Chapel
OS grid reference
NT 544 671
Coordinates
55.89506, -2.72974
Source
Historic Environment Scotland listing

Also on this page: flood risk · radon risk · weather exposure · detailed attributes ↓

Description

Yester Chapel, formerly known as St Cuthbert's Collegiate Church, is a 15th century chapel located at Yester House in Gifford. It features an east window dating from 1635 and has undergone later refacing. The west elevation, designed by the Adam Brothers in 1753, showcases a Rococo Gothic style. The chapel likely retains the choir and transepts of St Cuthbert's Collegiate Church, which served as Yester Parish Church until 1705.

The structure is built from large blocks of coursed sandstone, with a 15th century base course, an eaves cornice, and a slab slated roof.

The west elevation includes a gabled entrance bay with a recessed pointed-arch panel, an ogival doorway adorned with crocketted carvings and finials, and a studded door. Above the door is an ornate armorial flanked by small niches. An oval oculus at the apex of the recessed panel features an ornamented surround and looped tracery. The cornice has a pendant frieze, while the gablehead displays cusping, feathery crockets, and a finial. Diagonal set-off angle buttresses support the structure.

The east elevation features a reticulated traceried window from 1635, complete with a moulded surround in the choir jamb and a cross finial. The north and south sides are blank.

The transepts, located to the north and south, have set-off angle buttresses, masque corbels, and shaped mannered carvings above the cornice to the west. Each transept has three-light stone round-arched windows set in recessed segmental panels, topped with cross finials.

Inside, the chapel boasts pointed stone vaults at each jamb and depressed arches leading into the transepts. It houses Tweeddale burial monuments from the 16th, 17th, and 18th centuries, along with remnants of medieval wall painting.

Local climate

Yester Chapel (Formerly St Cuthbert's Collegiate Church), Yester House, Gifford receives an average of 900 mm of rain a year. This makes it wetter than 67% of listed buildings in the UK. Its exposure to wind-driven rain is lower than that of 51% of listed buildings.

It experiences an average of 30 freeze-thaw cycles a year, fewer than 64% of listed buildings. Of these, 19 follow at least 1 mm of rain in the preceding 48 hours. Average temperatures at this location have risen by 0.3°C per decade since 1991.

Averages for 1991–2020; temperature trend 1991–2025. Figures describe the wider area (a grid cell of roughly 10 km), not the individual site. Contains modified Copernicus Climate Change Service information 2026.

More on this building

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