Blackshiels, Fala is a Grade B listed building in the Midlothian local planning authority area, Scotland. First listed on 22 January 1971.
Blackshiels, Fala
- WRENN ID
- over-column-saffron
- Grade
- B
- Local Planning Authority
- Midlothian
- Constituency
- Midlothian MP: Kirsty McNeill (Lab)
- Country
- Scotland
- Date first listed
- 22 January 1971
- OS grid reference
- NT 436 609
- Coordinates
- 55.83814, -2.9009
- Source
- Historic Environment Scotland listing
Description
Blackshiels is a 17th-century building, originally a coaching inn, now a farmhouse. It is a one-and-a-half-storey structure with a low ground floor, constructed from rubble stone and featuring a skew-gabled roof covered in slate. Dormer windows are present, and a 19th-century addition projects from the west end, also with a corbie-step-gabled roof.
To the north are offices arranged around a courtyard, similarly built as one-and-a-half storeys, and featuring an elliptical archway to a passage.
Historically, Blackshiels served as the first stagecoach stop from Edinburgh on the road to Kelso. The renowned travellers James Boswell and Samuel Johnson stayed at the inn on 23rd November 1772, towards the end of their tour. Travel increased with the opening of the turnpike road to Lauder in 1834. Later additions to the building were constructed using stone taken from Fala House, built around 1745. The inn closed circa 1880.
Local climate
Blackshiels, Fala receives an average of 920 mm of rain a year. This makes it wetter than 70% of listed buildings in the UK. Its exposure to wind-driven rain is lower than that of 63% of listed buildings.
It experiences an average of 52 freeze-thaw cycles a year, more than 93% of listed buildings. Of these, 32 follow at least 1 mm of rain in the preceding 48 hours. Average temperatures at this location have risen by 0.3°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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- Weather exposure and heating demand — rain and frost month by month and year by year, wind direction, solar and humidity
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