Forse House is a Grade B listed building in the Highland local planning authority area, Scotland. First listed on 13 April 1971. 2 related planning applications.
Forse House
- WRENN ID
- solemn-lantern-rush
- Grade
- B
- Local Planning Authority
- Highland
- Constituency
- Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross MP: Jamie Stone (LD)
- Country
- Scotland
- Date first listed
- 13 April 1971
- Address
- Forse House, KW5 6DG
- OS grid reference
- ND 212 353
- Coordinates
- 58.29959, -3.34478
- Source
- Historic Environment Scotland listing
Description
Forse House is an earlier-mid 18th century, three-storey and attic, five-bay symmetrically fronted mansion, with a large early 19th century rear block of two storeys, having a four-bay west facade. Various single and two-storey additions create a rambling rear elevation. The entire building is harled with painted, tooled margins.
The main block features a centre door masked by a painted polished ashlar portico supported by paired Roman Doric columns and a corniced entablature. A wide centre entrance is topped with a fanlight. Windows are paired in the outer bays; the east and west gables are symmetrical and contain two windows (some are blind). Three later 19th century bargeboarded dormers are visible on the roof, along with symmetrical ridge and end stacks. A projecting gabled rear stairwell rises to a ball finial at its apex.
The 19th century block has piended dormers breaking the wallhead, rear paired gabled wallhead stacks, and a piended platform roof. The building retains 12-pane glazing and slate roofs.
Internally, the main house has decorative plaster cornices. The rear stairwell features a simple cast-iron balustrade with palmette detailing dating to the late 18th or early 19th century.
The estate was historically owned by the Sutherlands of Forse. Forse House is now a hotel and was described as "an elegant new house" built by Captain Sutherland in 1774. References to the building appear in Thomas Pennant’s A Tour in Scotland (1774) and in Groome’s Gazetteer of Scotland (1883).
Local climate
Forse House receives an average of 950 mm of rain a year. This makes it wetter than 73% of listed buildings in the UK. Its exposure to wind-driven rain is greater than that of 70% of listed buildings.
It experiences an average of 17 freeze-thaw cycles a year, fewer than 83% of listed buildings. Of these, 13 follow at least 1 mm of rain in the preceding 48 hours. Average temperatures at this location have risen by 0.2°C per decade since 1991.
Averages for 1991–2020; temperature trend 1991–2025. Figures describe the wider area (a grid cell of roughly 10 km), not the individual site. Contains modified Copernicus Climate Change Service information 2026.
More on this building
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- Full EPC report — heating system, energy costs, size, glazing, construction etc.
- No sale records on file
- Related listed building consents — 2 applications
- Detailed attributes — period, style, materials, features
- Flood risk assessment
- Radon risk assessment
- Weather exposure and heating demand — rain and frost month by month and year by year, wind direction, solar and humidity
Matched applications, energy data and sale records are assembled automatically and may contain errors. Flag incorrect data.