Garden Urn, Garden, Arniston House is a Grade B listed building in the Midlothian local planning authority area, Scotland. First listed on 14 September 1979.
Garden Urn, Garden, Arniston House
- WRENN ID
- stranded-cobalt-birch
- Grade
- B
- Local Planning Authority
- Midlothian
- Constituency
- Midlothian MP: Kirsty McNeill (Lab)
- Country
- Scotland
- Date first listed
- 14 September 1979
- OS grid reference
- NT 324 594
- Coordinates
- 55.82368, -3.07982
- Source
- Historic Environment Scotland listing
Description
Probably dating from the mid-18th century and likely designed by James Adam, this is an octagonal carved stone ornamental urn situated within the garden at Arniston House. The urn sits on an octagonal pedestal, which has a two-stepped base and a carved key frieze. The square base of the urn is elaborately carved with scrolled panels and topped with a domed finial. The urn originally formed part of the Wilderness, a landscape designed to the west of Arniston House, which was planted with larch and evergreen trees. Serpentine and symmetrical paths extended through the Wilderness, converging at a central point marked by Adam’s urn. It may be the “vase” referred to by Mary Cosh. Historical records, including James Adam’s sketchbooks, and references in publications on landscape gardening and architecture, document the urn’s existence and significance.
Local climate
Garden Urn, Garden, Arniston House sits in a wetter-than-average part of the UK, with an average of 980 mm of rain a year. This makes it wetter than 78% of listed buildings in the UK. Its exposure to wind-driven rain is lower than that of 53% of listed buildings.
It experiences an average of 55 freeze-thaw cycles a year, more than 95% of listed buildings. Of these, 34 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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- No EPC on record for this property
- No sale records on file
- No related consent applications matched
- 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
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