Lighthouse, Isle Of May

The Isle of May Lighthouse, designed by Robert Stevenson and built between 1815 and 1816, features a square, three-stage castellated tower that serves as the centerpiece of a substantial, symmetrical two-storey residential block with a basement. The building showcases a picturesque, castle-like style with Tudor Gothic details. The west front and tower are constructed of ashlar stone, while the other elevations are made of whin rubble with ashlar dressings. The side elevations have both long and short stones, and the building has flat roofs.

All elevations consist of three bays, with the outer advanced bays wrapping around the front and rear to create narrow mock turret details, which include tall, blind hood-moulded openings. Each bay features paired Tudor arched windows set in square architraves, with some windows being hood-moulded and others blind. Inside, there is a circular stair descending down a central well, with cast iron staging and tongue-and-grooved panelling.

The interior includes a circular stair in the tower with teardrop cast iron balusters, and the walls are plastered and lined to resemble ashlar. The first floor houses the Commissioner's Board Room, which boasts a large black marble chimneypiece with an iron grate, flanked by caryatid figures. The back plate of the chimneypiece depicts the Birth of Aphrodite, and there is a fireguard featuring a lyre motif. The base of the tower has a pointed-headed entrance with a panelled door, and each stage of the tower has set-offs and pointed windows with Y tracery on each face. Corbelled parapets are present throughout the building, with those on the residential block incorporating flues.

At the rear, a substantial storage block extends from the center of the elevation, featuring castellated turrets and square battered pylon blocks that are set into the slope of the land. The lantern, added in 1924 by David A. Stevenson, has a lattice frame and a light suspended on a mercury tank with French louvred crystals and lenses, with rotation powered by a clockwork mechanism and weights.