76 Eglinton Street, Beith

76 Eglinton Street, Beith

This classical villa was built around 1833 with significant alterations made around 1900. It is a 3-bay elevated single-storey building with an attic and basement on its principal street frontage, but the steeply sloping site to the rear accommodates 2 storeys and a sub-basement. The house features Grecian architectural details throughout. It is set back from the street with a cast-iron railed flying stair providing access, and cast-iron railings line the street boundary.

The façade is stuccoed with a base course and a band course running between the basement and ground floor. The bays are flanked by pilasters that support an entablature, with a panelled parapet above (possibly a later addition) and later dormers. The basement has channelled rustication, while the gables and rear elevation are harled. Painted angle margins complete the design.

The principal south-east elevation features a pair of Doric columns in antis at the entrance, with a recessed 2-leaf timber panelled door leading to the vestibule. Above the door is a margin-paned letterbox fanlight, and beyond it sits a modern glazed inner door. The door surround is moulded in the Grecian style with rosettes. The ground floor windows have moulded architraves and sills. Three large aediculed dormers with bipartite windows and slated cheeks rise above; the central dormer is particularly notable, featuring scrolled brackets and a segmental pediment.

The north-west rear elevation displays small arched blocked openings at sub-basement level flanking central stone steps. A central 2-leaf panelled door with modern glazed inner door is flanked by narrow windows and a segmental-arched panel above, which is topped by a bracketed cornice. Single windows with raised cills and bracketed cornices flank this central composition. A central stair window sits above, with a single window to its right. A later projecting piend-roofed oriel bay supported on 2 square columns extends from the left side.

The windows throughout are timber sash and case design. The ground and basement front elevation features plate glass, whilst the dormers have 8-pane sashes and the south-west gable and rear have 12-pane examples. The later bay to the rear has plate glass lower sashes and 12-pane coloured upper sashes. The stair window to the rear is a painted glass 3-pane design.

The roof is covered in grey slates with straight skews, a stone ridge, and corniced end stacks. Fourteen hexagonal clay cans remain in their original positions. Rendered retaining walls flank the street boundary on either side.

The interior retains a good decorative scheme. The entrance hall features an acanthus leaf ceiling rose and cornice. Panelled doors with 8 fields open to the principal rooms, each with architraved surrounds incorporating panelled pilasters and continuous entablature. Skirting and dado rail run throughout. An impressive cantilevered stair rises from the lower ground to the first floor, with an elaborate cast-iron balustrade and mahogany hand rail. The stair is lit by a window containing 3 panels of painted glass decorated with Glasgow Style rose motifs and a landscape vignette. A small stained glass window at the front door features a Glasgow Style rose.

The drawing room retains a dado, picture rail and cornice, with an entablatured doorcase and grey marble chimneypiece fitted with a cast-iron grate. A fitted glazed timber cupboard with a round-arched door is built in, and an oriel bay flanked by pilasters commands the room.

The former dining room has a cornice featuring an ornate anthemion and palmette frieze, with picture and dado rails. The doorcase is pilastered and entablatured, and windows are corniced. A carved oak Edwardian chimneypiece with fluted Ionic columns and floral panels above dominates the room. A red tiled hearth sits below a cast-iron grate with brass hood.

Small plain rooms to the front each contain a chimneypiece, press and plain moulded cornice. Two plain attic bedrooms with a small eaves room to the rear are served by a centre bathroom finished with match-boarded panelling and Vitriolite bath panels.

Ancillary buildings include a piend-roofed single-storey rendered laundry annex to the north-east gable. A brick-built former stable is attached to the laundry, its interior finished with red glazed tiles and containing 2 stalls divided by boarded timber with curved iron railings. The posts are capped with ball and leaf finals. A later brick-built 2-storey former coach house stands to the north.