Rothes House

Rothes House is a former mill-owner's house built in the gabled cottage style, predominantly dating to 1845, with possible remnants of an earlier building on the site. The house was enlarged and remodelled during the later 19th century. It is located beside the River Leven near the west entrance to the former Tullis Russell Paper Mills. The building is two-storey with an attic and basement, built of narrow bands of dressed stone ashlar with droved quoins, stone cills and mullions. An addition to the rear forms a T-plan. The windows have timber sash and case frames containing horizontal or 'lying-pane' glazing. The roof is covered with graded grey slates and punctuated by aligned groups of tall, cavetto-coped and shouldered, diamond-plan chimney stacks.

The south (entrance) elevation features a broad, advanced gabled bay to the right, with a full-height canted window corniced at both floors and extending into the gablehead. A part-glazed and panelled timber door, with margined glass fanlight, is located in the bay, alongside a window to the left of centre, with a dormer-headed window above breaking the eaves. A lean-to porch with cast iron columns, added in 1924, crosses the central bay and abuts the advanced gable to the right; the supporting columns are linked by delicate cast iron arcading.

The north elevation has an open basement level on falling ground sloping down to the river, with a door at the centre, a window to the left and a small opening to the right. The blank gable above is surmounted by four diamond stacks. The west and east elevations of the rear wing each have two dormer-headed windows breaking the eaves.

The interior, observed in 1996 and documented through photographs from 2018 and 2021, includes an inner hall with a parquet floor, a segmental-headed passageway running under the stair, and a curving stair with panelled walls. A circular roof-light cupola with plain astragals is also present. Decorative cast iron balusters and a timber handrail were removed from the main stair prior to 2018. One ground floor room contains a timber fireplace with fluted pilasters and swag decorations. Elsewhere, the interiors retain simple moulded fireplaces, plain cornicing, panelled timber shutters and window backs, elbow linings and soffits, and brass sash lifts.

A timber framed, glazed conservatory and hot house, adjoining the west gable, has largely collapsed, with the base and north wall partly remaining (as of 2023).

The boundary walls have been removed to allow access to and from the adjacent biomass energy plant, which was constructed between 2013 and 2015.