Leys Park Nursing Home, Leys Park Road, Dunfermline

Leys Park Nursing Home, Leys Park Road, Dunfermline

A 2-storey nursing home originally constructed as a poorhouse, later used as a hospital. The main building comprises a 19-bay block designed by Thomas Brown of Edinburgh in 1843, with the west wing forming part of this original construction. In 1905, Andrew Muirhead of the architectural partnership Muirhead and Rutherford partially refronted the building and added an east wing. Later additions to the north include various extensions and outbuildings.

The principal south elevation displays a near-symmetrical classical composition with an Edwardian Baroque centrepiece. This features a slightly projecting 5-bay ashlar section with moulded cornice and channelled quoins. All window and door openings are corniced with Gibbs surrounds. The central entrance bay contains a broken-bed pediment with flanking channelled pilaster strips above a keystoned lintel surmounted by a segmental pediment, with a 2-leaf panelled timber door below. Above the entrance sits a window with a keystoned lintel beneath a curved breaking-eaves pediment and flanking scrolls at its base. Either side lie paired flanking bays, each with windows to both floors. Beyond these, single flanking bays are set back slightly with bipartite windows featuring central column mullions to each floor. The outer flanking sections are set back further. To the left, a 5-bay section contains a consoled-pediment entrance at centre with regular fenestration below, followed by a slightly projecting 6th bay. To the right, 5 regularly fenestrated bays are followed by a 6th bay set back at the outer right, with bipartite mullioned windows to the first floor. A lean-to conservatory extends along the right wall below. An entrance with 2-leaf panelled timber door and segmental fanlight stands to the left, with a triple segmental-headed window-arcade to the right.

The building is constructed of coursed stugged sandstone with droved ashlar dressings and polished ashlar to the principal elevation centrepiece. The rear and lesser elevations employ less finely coursed stugged sandstone and coursed rubble with droved ashlar dressings. A 1st-floor cill band and eaves band mark the principal elevation; architraved openings throughout, with aprons to 1st-floor windows (except that set back to the outer right).

The west elevation comprises a 3-bay end section to the main range on the right, with alterations at ground floor converting the flanking outer bays to entrances. To the left stands the original 4-bay rear wing set back and substantially altered, with enlarged ground-floor windows; an altered section with additions projects further to the outer left.

The east elevation features a single projecting bay end section to the main range on the left (altered at first floor), with a lean-to conservatory adjoining. A later harled flat-roofed addition stands to the right.

The north elevation is irregular and substantially altered. A later flat-roofed harled addition obscures most of the east wing. A slightly projecting section incorporating a catslide-roofed original stairtower marks the centre. Two bays set back to the left and three to the right terminate at projecting gable-ended sections; that to the right forms part of the original rear wing. Various outbuildings stand forward to either side adjoining it, including a later brick and harled structure with a square-plan brick industrial chimney.

Windows comprise a mixture of 12-pane timber sash-and-case windows and modern replacements with casement opening sections. Grey slate roofs are piended, except to the rear wing to the west and rear projecting section to the east, both with coped skews. Gablehead stacks with band courses flank the rear wing to the west and rear projecting section to the east; a ridge stack with band course stands to the west of the main range. Chimney cans are missing.

The interior was not inspected as of 1999.

Boundary features include a pair of square-plan polished sandstone ashlar gatepiers to the southwest, both chamfered with friezes and pyramid caps. A similar but smaller and simpler gatepier without frieze stands at the pedestrian entrance to the east, each with a wrought-iron gate. A coursed roughly stugged sandstone rubble boundary wall adjoins to the east and terminates at a pair of gatepiers with pyramid coping to the southeast. Similar walling encloses the former grounds on the north and east sides.