Strathenry House

Strathenry House

William Burn designed this substantial Jacobethan country house in 1824 for Robert Douglas, a local landowner. The building was enlarged with additions around 1900 by Henry F Kerr, and a rear wing was removed during the 20th century. It is a 2-storey structure with a basement, constructed in dressed ashlar with long and short quoins, stone mullions, and chamfered arrises. The main entrance features a distinctive round-headed gable, while gabled windows at first floor incorporate blind arrow slits. Hoodmoulds are continuous with the string course at ground floor and eaves course. A central stairhead cupola surrounded by roof pitches is not visible from ground level.

The principal east elevation is symmetrical with three bays. A central projecting bay contains a recessed tripartite entrance with moulded surround, a pitch pine studded door with narrow sidelights and a 5-pane fanlight, and a bipartite window at first floor beneath a semi-circular gablet with kneelers and shaft finial on a foliate corbel. The flanking bays contain tripartite windows to both floors.

The south elevation has three bays with a tripartite window to the right bay and two bipartite windows to the left, with regular windows to the first floor. Part of the basement is visible, containing a bipartite window to the right bay and single windows to the centre and left.

The west elevation comprises a projecting gable to the left with bipartite windows to both floors and a glazed door on the return to the right, a shallow projecting gable to the right with quadripartite windows to both floors, and a centre recessed section with narrow windows to the right and windows to the left at ground and first floor levels.

The north elevation is asymmetrical. A piend-roofed projection to the left has bipartite windows to both floors, with the top left window blinded. A modern entrance porch in a re-entrant angle obscures the original doorway, with an adjacent window to the right. There are three windows at first floor with a narrow window between them. The outer right bay has blinded windows to both ground and first floor levels. The basement is visible to the right of the projecting bay fronting a courtyard area that originally housed servants' quarters. A door to the left in the projecting bay has a window on its return and an adjacent window to the right, with a garage door to the outer right.

Windows predominantly feature 12-pane or 18-pane lying-pane glazing patterns in sash and case windows. Ground floor windows to the east, south and west have plate glass lower sashes, while basement and most remaining windows retain 12-pane glazing in sash and case windows. Grey slate roofing is used throughout, with ashlar coped skews on ashlar bases. Grouped chimneys stacks with flat coping include a group of three polygonal stacks to the west. Cast-iron downpipes with decorative rainwater hoppers are featured.

The interior contains a glazed and ornately astragalled hall door in a broken apex pediment doorcase leading to the main hallway, which has an egg and dart cornice and side glazed cupola over the stairwell. A wooden handrail with brass railings ascends the stair. The south drawing room retains delicate neo-classical plasterwork, while the east room displays heavier plasterwork decoration of structural members and brackets. Original fanlit doors serve the upper floor north-facing workrooms. Many window shutters remain throughout. The basement contains vaulted storage areas and evidence of the original kitchen area.

Boundary walls of coped whinstone rubble to the northwest contain paired bee boles and a single blocked opening, with evidence of possibly a further bee bole. A blocked low doorway and adjacent small window lead to a small stone building on the neighbouring property Strathendry Castle. Ornate scroll-detailed ironwork railings front the north doorway and courtyard.

The New Statistical Account describes Strathenry as "a very handsome building, in the style of the old English manor house of Queen Elizabeth's time". William Burn's original drawings show the west elevation with both gables corbelled and chimneyed, and a plan of the kitchen court indicates the area now demolished. Burn was also engaged in alterations to Strathendry Castle in 1824. An 1865–71 survey reported that Mr Douglas discovered several blackened holes in the ground believed to be Roman cooking places, and a Roman coin was found in garden ground nearby. The remains of a walled garden stand beyond the current western boundary.