197 Nithsdale Road

This is a two-storey and basement period villa, built in 1894. It is thought to have been subdivided around 1977. The villa is constructed of cream sandstone, with squared and snecked stone on the sides and rear, and ashlar on the front elevation. Chamfered arrises are a prominent feature, along with stone mullions.

The front elevation is two bays wide, with a recessed porch in the re-entrant angle to the left. The porch has a Corinthian capitalled column supporting a balustraded canopy, topped with a statue of a lion on a heraldic shield. The porch contains tall, two-leaf panelled doors. To the outer right is a full-height canted window with a dividing cornice and a piended roof. To the left is a corniced tripartite window at ground level and a bipartite window on the first floor. The left side elevation is blank, while the porch is recessed to the right of centre. The centre of the elevation features stair windows, above which is a tall window positioned over a pair of smaller windows.

The side and rear elevations also feature off-centre windowed bays. A lower, two-storey, piend-roofed wing, containing a garage and service quarters, projects from the left side of the rear. The garage has folding, boarded doors with small-pane upper panels, and there are smaller windows in the accommodation above. The windows are timber sash and case, with plate glass and four-pane glazing patterns, although the front windows have a modern glazing pattern. Bracketed eaves and profiled guttering add detail, along with wallhead stone stacks.

The interior retains a decorative scheme, possibly also designed by Stephen Adam and Son. A stained glass door in the vestibule depicts Ceres, goddess of summer. The vestibule window shows bird scenes and lily pads within a mahogany panelled recess. A depressed mahogany archway leads to a hall with an arcade above, also glazed with decorative stained glass panels, each centred with a female head. The stair window depicts an Elizabethan hawking scene, with portraits of Shakespeare and Robert Burns positioned below, strapwork above, and vine swags flanking. In the first-floor drawing room, upper sash windows portray Lancelot and Elaine, King Arthur, and Queen Guinevere. The mahogany staircase has urn finials on the newels, and an unusual railing pattern. Several fine timber chimneypieces are present: the front ground floor room has carved panels and bracket-flanked niches with corbelled rests; the rear ground floor room features fluted pilasters flanking the chimneypiece; and the front first-floor room has a colonnette-flanked chimneypiece, a hand-painted hearth tile, and a decorative brass canopy. Other chimneypieces have bracketed mantle pieces. A deep frieze of decorative plasterwork adorns the bedrooms, and ornamental ceilings are present, one of which is concealed by a false ceiling.