Sweethope Hotel, Inveresk

The Sweethope Hotel, Inveresk, is a mid to later 19th-century building incorporating earlier fabric. It is a 2-storey and attic house, now a hotel, though with regrettable modern additions. The building consists of a taller block to the north, a recessed block to the south (showing the earlier fabric), and a 4-stage Italianate entrance tower in the re-entrant angle.

The original buildings are constructed of rubble sandstone, with grey, droved sandstone used for the mid to later 19th-century work. The windows have chamfered reveals, along with base and band courses.

The west elevation features a tower with a keystoned round arched doorway with a semi-circular plate glass fanlight and 2-leaf panelled doors on its south return. A keystoned bipartite window is present on the west side. Above the doorway, the first floor has a tripartite window facing west, and a bipartite window is above the door. The third stage is divided by a cornice that breaks the eaves, and includes two semi-circular windows on both the south and west elevations. The fourth stage is corbelled, with two regular windows on each elevation, and features deeply overhanging eaves to a shallowly pitched piended roof, topped by a decorative metal weathervane.

To the left of the tower is an advanced, wide, gabled bay with a canted window at ground and first floor (with rounded angles) and a round arched attic window. Two recessed, lower bays flank the tower to the right, representing the earlier house, with a round arched, keystoned window on each floor to the left bay. A canted window with a matching attic window is in the gabled bay on the outer right. A modern conservatory addition connects the building to a former service wing to the southeast, which has been further adapted with a sunroom. Uncomfortable additions are also present on the north elevation and rear.

Sash and case windows have a plate glass glazing pattern. Timber eaves brackets and decorative cast-iron finials are prominent. The roof is covered in grey slates, with corniced end stacks.

The interior has largely undergone modern refurbishment, but decorative plaster cornices have been retained.

A retaining wall and gateway stand nearby. The wall has semi-circular coping to sandstone rubble, with quadrants enclosing a drive, square piers and bearing lantern-lamps. A fine, classical, corniced pedestrian gateway, dating from the earlier house, is situated by the roadside. It has a rusticated ashlar surround and a blocking course with a blank tablet, with the inscription "Sweethope" incised above the lintel. It also features a decorative cast- and wrought-iron gate.