Dura House

Dura House is an early 18th century house, possibly built on an older foundation, with significant additions designed by James Milne in 1861. The original 18th century section is three storeys high and rendered with a lined ashlar finish, featuring chamfered ashlar margins, moulded skewputs, crowsteps, and corniced end stacks. It is covered with slate. Later additions are constructed from coursed squared rubble with droved ashlar dressings.

The north front has three bays, with a blind window at the second floor level. The sill for the centre window on the first floor has been lowered. A later two-storey projecting wing is rounded towards the north and has a piended roof.

The west front shows the two-bay gable of the 18th century house, three storeys and an attic high, joined to the south by an advanced, three-storey centre bay of Milne's 1861 work. This section has a crowstepped chimney gable flanked by conical-roofed bartizans. A wide single bay, with bipartite windows on the first and principal floors and a gabled wallhead dormer above, balances the earlier gable. A large bartizan is positioned at the angle with the south front, mirrored by another bartizan on the south front, which flank a two-bay gable with a centre corbelled chimney stack. This gable connects to a second gable via a recessed, two-storey crenellated link with bipartite windows on the first floor.

The east gable is crowstepped and has three windows on the first floor and two on the second. A slender, round angle tower corbels outwards at the second floor and has a bellcast conical roof. The east front is largely plain, except at the northeast corner, where the gable is carried up as a small square tower with a crenellated parapet and a taller square cap-house at the corner.

To the northeast of the house is a single-storey and basement rectangular outhouse, mainly constructed of rubble with alterations using droved ashlar. An outside staircase provides access to the upper floor on the west side. It has a slated piended roof. A modern lean-to garage is attached to the north. Original design drawings for the 1861 additions were exhibited at the Royal Scottish Academy.