Giffen Millhouse, Dunlop Road, Barrmill

This is a mid-18th century millhouse with an adjoining former corn mill dating to the early 19th century, situated on Dunlop Road in Barrmill.

The millhouse is a two-storey, three-bay structure set back from the road. The front features a central doorway with a lugged architrave, a bolection-moulded frieze, and a cornice. There are three windows on the first floor, which may have been enlarged. The windows have painted margins and roll-moulded surrounds, with a moulded eaves course. The exterior is finished with painted cement harl. The rear elevation has three bays with enlarged openings and a single-storey, piend-roofed wing in the centre. A lean-to projects from the re-entrant angle on the left. The windows are fitted with UPVC glazing. The roof is covered with grey slates laid in diminishing courses, with a stone ridge. Stone skews are straight on the front elevation and sawtooth with beaked skewputts at the rear. Chimneys are located at the ends of the building. Cast-iron rainwater goods are present.

The mill occupies a sloping site that projects forward from the millhouse. It is roofless and currently derelict. The structure comprises a long two-storey range with a basement at the gable and rear, and a range to the left with a forestair providing access. Openings are irregularly spaced. A doocot is incorporated into the north gable, featuring a small painted relief owl sculpture below, which is reportedly from the ruins of Giffen Castle. Sawtooth skews are present. Some original machinery remains inside the mill.

The interior of the millhouse was not inspected in 2003, and it appears that no original features survive.

The former corn mill has been empty and derelict for some time. Originally, the mill was limewashed with a slate roof. The owl sculpture set into the north gable is believed to have originated from the ruins of Giffen Castle, built by the Montgomeries of Giffen. Materials from the castle were purportedly used to construct the mill and later the millhouse. An image in Donald Reid’s Old Beith (2000) shows a view of the mill from the rear when it was intact. The site was marked on the first edition Ordnance Survey map of 1858, as a corn mill on the second edition map of 1897 and the third edition of 1910.