Walled Garden, Flowerdale House

Walled Garden, Flowerdale House

Flowerdale House is a substantial mansion dating from 1738, with major restorations and additions by the architectural firm A. Maitland and Sons in 1904. The building consists of a double-pile, 2-storey main block with attic, spanning 6 bays, and a similar-height extension to the west. Both are harled with ashlar margins.

The original house features two slightly projecting centre bays topped with a crowstepped gable. The principal entrance is on the first floor (piano nobile), approached by a T-shaped flight of steps with a moulded, lugged and corniced architrave. The 1904 alterations introduced a diagonally panelled door. The first floor displays tall segmental-headed windows, while the crowstepped gable contains two large symmetrical windows. Four swept dormers were added in 1904, and an apex chimney crowns the roof. Ground floor windows are smaller in proportion.

The rear elevation of the original house retains much of its earlier character, with a gabled centre of 2 bays (crowstepped and with apex stack), long first-floor windows, and a single gable attic window, one of which is blocked. Four swept dormers were introduced in 1904.

The 1904 west wing is 2-storey with attic and presents an asymmetrical facade. Its most distinctive feature is a large bowed bay on the right elevation, rising the full height and containing 3 segmental-headed first-floor windows with band course, cornice and parapet. To the left stands a gabled bay with paired segmental-headed bipartite windows on the first floor and similar but smaller flat-headed bipartites in the attic. Two swept dormers match those of the front.

Windows throughout display 18- and 12-pane glazing on the first floor and 9-pane on the ground floor, with chamfered margins. Stacks on the new wing echo the design of the originals in ashlar with moulded cope and simple string course. Slate roofs and moulded eaves cornices complete the exterior.

The interior retains significant 18th-century features. The south-west parlour preserves original 1738 panelling, a lugged chimney piece, lugged doorcases and panelled doors. One rear room contains early panelling with a timber ceiling decorated with geometric moulded panels. A continuous passage runs the full length of the house from east to west at both ground and first-floor levels, including through the new wing. The original staircase was removed in 1904 and replaced with a new one, and the centre and left front rooms of the original range were thrown into one space to accommodate the new staircase and extended entrance hall.

The walled garden to the rear is constructed of rubble walls with dressed stone cope.

Dating inscriptions appear at the east gable skewputt (the figures 17), the south-east skewputts, and the north-east and north-west skewputts (with the figures 38 and initial AM, and IM respectively).

Flowerdale was the seat of the Mackenzies of Gairloch. Osgood Mackenzie referred to it as Tigh Dige in his memoir A Hundred Years in the Highlands (1921). The segmental-headed detailing on the front windows of the original house appears to be a 1904 alteration. A small 19th-century ice house for salmon fishing survives in the hillside near the entrance drive.

The western 2 bays of the 1904 wing now form a separate dwelling called Westerdale. The internal passages that once linked the two properties are now closed at their junction points.