The Knowe, Erngath Road, Bo'Ness

The Knowe is a large, late 19th-century villa, originally designed by Porteus in 1897, with later additions by Matthew Steele in 1907. It is located on Erngath Road, Bo'Ness. The house is a two- and three-storey, three-bay structure, retaining notable interior decorative schemes. Constructed from squared and snecked tooled sandstone with ashlar dressings and some harl with brick dressings, it features corbels, mock half-timbering, and a variety of windows including stone mullioned and transomed designs with chamfered arrises.

The west (principal) elevation is two-storeys high. The central bay has a keystoned basket-arched opening below a small eight-light window, leading to a stone porch with a ball finial, which gives way to a single window on the first floor. To the left, a gabled bay projects, with a canted window at ground level that corbels out to a further, four-part canted window at the first floor. A bay to the right has a wide-centre tripartite window at ground level and a single window above that breaks the eaves into a ball-finialled dormerhead. All windows are transomed.

The east elevation is asymmetrically fenestrated and three-storeys high. It incorporates a two-stage turret at the outer left angle that rises above the roofline, projecting square-plan tripartite windows to the first and second floors on the right, and a further second-floor tripartite jettied out over the outer right angle, both of these bays being half-timbered.

The north elevation has been altered, featuring a broad, stepped, half-timbered gable that juts out over the first floor, above a small canted first-floor window. A modern conservatory and a stone-pedimented dormer window are located in the centre bay and a blank gabled bay breaks the eaves to the right.

Various glazing types are present, including timber sash and case windows with nine panes over plate glass, with horns to the canted bays on the west elevation, some four-pane windows without horns, and twelve-pane over twelve-pane glazing to the turret. Casement windows are also present. The roof is covered in grey slates, with coped ashlar gablehead stacks to the north and south, and mid-roof stacks to the east, as well as some polygonal cans. Ashlar-coped skew with moulded skewputts are present, alongside overhanging eaves.

The interior boasts well-preserved decorative schemes. A timber screen door features etched glass in the upper panel, along with a stained glass fanlight and sidelights. The timber-panelled entrance hall and stairwell include encaustic floor tiles and a timber staircase. Further stained glass also exists. The timber-panelled billiard room has a timber ceiling with detailing in a yellow and black chequerboard inlay, and further green and black chequerboard inlay. Several original fireplaces and chimneypieces remain, along with a timber-panelled bathroom with original fittings, including a showerhead.

To the southwest, a pair of square ashlar gatepiers with pyramidal caps support an impressive two-leaf timber and cast-iron gate with studded decoration and ornamental hinges. A low rubble boundary wall is accompanied by a scrolled iron railing.