School And Boundary Wall, Castlebay, Barra

The building is a former primary school and schoolhouse located at Bagh A'Chaisteil in Castlebay, Barra, and is believed to have been designed by Dr. Alexander Ross around 1879. It is a single-storey structure with an attic, featuring four bays and later additions and alterations. The exterior is constructed from squared and snecked rubble sandstone, accented with long and short sandstone dressings, and includes long and short quoins, overhanging eaves, and timber bargeboards.

The south elevation is asymmetrical, with a gabled entrance bay that is advanced to the penultimate bay on the left. It has a pointed-arched doorway with a two-leaf timber door and a single-pane fanlight. To the right, there is a tripartite window on the ground floor of the flanking bay. The outer right gabled bay is also advanced and features a bipartite window on the ground floor, a pointed-arched window centered in the attic, and a window on the ground floor of the right return. The outer left bay has an elongated gableted tripartite window that breaks the eaves.

The east elevation is also asymmetrical, with a window on the ground floor of the left bay and a gabled bay advanced to the right, which includes a glazed timber door with a letterbox fanlight and a pointed-arched window set in the gablehead. The bays to the outer right were not visible in 1999.

The north elevation was not seen in 1999. The west elevation is asymmetrical as well, featuring a gabled bay to the right with two windows in the center, flanked to the left by an elongated bipartite window that breaks the eaves with a gable. The left bay is advanced and has an off-centre window to the left, along with a window on the ground floor of the right return, which is flanked by a small four-pane window. There are also two gableted windows in the attic floor, while the left return and flanking bays to the left were not seen in 1999.

The building has a variety of timber sash and case windows, along with some modern PVCu windows. The roof is covered with grey slate, with some sections replaced with lead and tiled ridges. It features coped gableheads and ridge stacks with octagonal cans, as well as cast-iron rainwater goods.

The interior was not seen in 1999. Surrounding the school is a random rubble boundary wall with semi-circular rubble coping, enclosing the property to the north, south, east, and west. There are two pairs of square-plan gatepiers on the south wall, topped with pyramidal caps and accompanied by cast-iron gates.