Starley Bank

Starley Bank is a mid to later 19th-century, two-storey, three-bay house. It has a piend and platform roof. The house is constructed of droved ashlar with long and shortwork quoins, polished margins, band and eaves courses, a moulded cornice, and stone mullions.

The south elevation, which serves as the entrance front, features a deep-set panelled door with a letterbox fanlight in a moulded doorcase. To the right of the door is a chamfered window, and to the left is a window concealed behind a modern conservatory. On the first floor, there is a chamfered window to the right, a central window, and a window to the left. On the outer right, a slightly recessed, rendered wall has a central blind window, likely for a garage.

The west elevation has a modern conservatory on the right, obscuring a door. A small window is centrally located on the ground floor, with a further window to the left, and a window and door in a single-storey wing to the outer left. A tiny window sits centrally on the first floor.

The north elevation features a single-storey wing to the centre and right at ground level, with a window to the left and three windows on the first floor.

The east elevation includes a modern dry-dashed garage extension at ground level, centred and to the left, with a window to the right. A single-storey wing has a timber door to the left and an adjacent window, and another timber door to the outer right.

The windows are a mix of plate glass and 8- and 12-pane glazing patterns in timber sash and case windows, with some modern small-pane fixed windows located on the east side. The roof is covered in grey slates, and the chimney stacks are hipped, coped ashlar, with moulded cans.

Inside, the entrance hall has encaustic tiles, leading to a part-glazed tripartite vestibule screen. This screen is flanked by leaded lights with coloured glass and plate glass fanlights. A curved staircase has decorative cast-iron balusters and a timber handrail; the stair window is frosted with coloured margins. Decorative cornicing and plasterwork are also present, alongside some original chimneypieces, one of which has tile slips and a decorated cast-iron fireback.

A coped rubble terrace wall has square-coped piers, with steps leading down to coursed rubble boundary walls. These walls have semicircular ashlar coping and pyramid-coped ashlar gatepiers.

Starley Bank was built before 1862 by Mr. Hutchison, Session Clerk for Burntisland Parish Church. He preserved oak panels salvaged from the old pulpit destroyed in 1822 and from a church refit in 1862, later using them to line a summer house designed similarly to the original pulpit. Mr. Young commented on the house’s attractive lining of panels. The current owner saved two of these panels from a derelict building. By 1890, the building was occupied by John Wishart, manager of Grange distillery, and in 1960, it was occupied by British Aluminium.