55 John Street, Penicuik

55 John Street in Penicuik is a mid to late 19th-century, two-storey, three-bay symmetrical classical villa constructed of coursed polished sandstone. The building features a base course, a band course between the floors, and an eaves course.

The principal elevation on the southwest side has an advanced pilastered and corniced doorpiece at the center, originally a two-leaf four-panel timber door, now replaced with a single door that has a two-pane fanlight above it. There are windows flanking the door and in each bay on the first floor.

The southeast and northwest elevations are made of random rubble and are blank. The northeast (rear) elevation was not visible in 1999.

The villa has 12-pane timber sash and case windows and a grey slate piended roof. It features cast-iron rainwater goods, a coped ashlar wallhead stack on the northwest elevation, and a coped, rendered, and lined wallhead stack on the southeast elevation, both topped with hexagonal cans.

The interior was not seen in 1999.

The boundary walls consist of low coursed ashlar walls at the street, topped with saddleback copes, although the railings are missing. There is an ashlar boundary wall with semicircular coping on the northwest side, which sweeps down to the southwest and terminates in an ashlar gatepier with a shallow pyramidal cap.