Tain Sheriff Court

Thomas Brown II, 1848-1849 with 1873 additions and alterations by A Maitland and Sons, and incorporating 1706-1733 tolbooth to southeast. Prominently situated on principal road in the burgh town

Court house: 2-storey and attic, symmetrical 3-bay elevation with 1873 gabled bay returning to Castle Brae, all in Scots Baronial and Tudor style. Tooled ashlar with ashlar dressings and chamfered angles. String course at ground floor linking hoodmoulds. Centre door flanked by pairs of round arched windows. 3 bipartite round arched windows at first floor with squared hoodmoulds. Crenellated parapet with corbelled angle turrets topped by conical roofs and ball finials. 4-bay elevation to Castle Brae of coursed rubble with ashlar dressings.

Tolbooth: Alexander Stronach, contractor; 1706-1733. Large square-plan 2-stage tower of coursed rubble. South elevation with moulded, round arched doorway (contemporary with later court house) with niche containing lion rampant above. Single window to each stage with chamfered reveals. West elevation with round arched window at ground floor and small blind window at 2nd and 3rd stages. 4 small angle turrets with stone conical roofs, ball finials and diminutive gabletted openings. Similar detailing to centre steeple topped by later weather cock. Later (circa 1877) corbelled parapet to house clock faces. Bronze Seaforth Highlanders memorial plaque fixed to ground floor, inscribed 'To the undying memory of 8432 comrades belonging to the ten battalions of the regiment who gave their lives for their country in the Great War'.

The interior, seen in 2014, is arranged around a central southwest facing courtroom on the ground floor and with an open well staircase to the east. The courtroom has a number of 6-panel doors and a high, deeply coved ceiling with thin ribs, bosses, moulded and decorative cornicing, decorative plaster quatrefoil roof vents and ornate central rose. The public seating and courtroom fittings have been replaced in the 1980s in a period style. Two shallow niches flank the wall behind the bench, a third niche is present in to the rear (north) wall of the courtroom. There is elaborate decorative cornicing to other rooms and the hallways. Panelled doors throughout with moulded architraves. The staircase has decorative metal barley twist balusters and a timber handrail. The windows are timber sash and case, most with panelled shutters. The interior of the tolbooth is open to the 1st floor, and has an open well stone stair with decorative metal railing and timber banister. A stone turnpike stair continues on 1st floor providing access to the bell chamber.