Halls is a Grade A listed building in the East Lothian local planning authority area, Scotland. First listed on 17 May 1989. Farmhouse. 2 related planning applications.

Halls

WRENN ID
gilded-timber-barley
Grade
A
Local Planning Authority
East Lothian
Constituency
Lothian East MP: Mr Douglas Alexander (Lab)
Country
Scotland
Date first listed
17 May 1989
Type
Farmhouse
Address
Halls, EH42 1RN
OS grid reference
NT 653 727
Coordinates
55.94668, -2.5564
Source
Historic Environment Scotland listing

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

Description

This is a substantial farmhouse, largely dating from the late 18th century, significantly altered and extended in 1860 by Frederick Thomas Pilkington. The building is two storeys high and asymmetrical in design. The south and west elevations are faced with stugged ashlar, featuring bull-faced stone dressings. The rear and east sides retain squared and snecked rubble masonry of the original farmhouse, with ashlar margins. A battered base course runs along the base of the building.

The south elevation features Pilkington’s addition to the left, incorporating an advanced gable with a canted ground floor window featuring shouldered jambs and quasi-column stone mullions with foliate capitals. The first floor above is bipartite with a slender column mullion with a similar capital. A squat, sturdy column supports a piend-roofed porch, set into the re-entrant angle, with a foliate capital and pointed archways to the south and east. Three recessed bays follow, with a first floor bipartite window to the right, the cill of which is cut to accommodate the porch and column mullion. Two further bays to the right represent the original farmhouse, displaying mannered jambs. Three first floor windows to the right were raised by Pilkington, breaking the eaves with a swept, continuous shallow dormerhead. The original front door at the centre has been blocked and replaced with windows. A slightly recessed, piended lean-to outbuilding is situated to the outer right.

The west elevation shows an advanced, chamfered gabled bay to the left, with a raised panel at centre, extending under the eaves. A ground floor bipartite window has a capital and lugged lights; the first floor has a bipartite window. A small, piend-roofed extension, with narrow windows to the west and a south return, fills the re-entrant angle at ground level. A first floor window breaks the eaves within a half-piended gabled dormerhead. An advanced stack, battered above the eaves with coping and a blind arcade, is situated to the blank right bays. The east gable of the original farmhouse is blank, with a lean-to outbuilding attached. A door on the north return is labelled "DAIRY" on its lintel; the rear elevation features a stair window of the earlier house and a shallow lean-to porch at ground level. The Pilkington addition slightly advances to the exterior, with an adjoining outbuilding at ground level. The windows are largely large-paned astragalled sash and case types, with smaller windows on the first floor.

The roof is covered with grey slates, and coped stone gable end stacks rise from the roof, including one at the ridge. Zig-zag chamfering adorns the arrises of the kingposts within the gable heads, creating a "shaved barley sugar" effect. Scalloped barge-boarding is particularly elaborate on the single-storey outbuilding at the south.

Inside, the woodwork dates from 1860 and is of stained pine. A dog leg stair features a barley sugar balustrade and acorn finials; door surrounds and panelled doors have scalloped chamfering. Decorative plasterwork is also present. A winding stone stair with a cast-iron balustrade, a remnant of the earlier house, has been retained.

The site includes rubble boundary walls and gatepiers.

Local climate

Halls receives an average of 870 mm of rain a year. This makes it wetter than 62% of listed buildings in the UK. Its exposure to wind-driven rain is lower than that of 52% of listed buildings.

It experiences an average of 29 freeze-thaw cycles a year, fewer than 67% 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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  • Full EPC report — heating system, energy costs, size, glazing, construction etc.
  • No sale records on file
  • Related listed building consents — 2 applications
  • Detailed attributes — period, style, materials, features
  • Flood risk assessment
  • Radon risk assessment
  • Weather exposure and heating demand — rain and frost month by month and year by year, wind direction, solar and humidity
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