Walled Garden, Grainbank, Ayre Road, Kirkwall

This is a substantial complex of buildings, incorporating a villa, coach house, stable and byre, and a walled garden, located near Kirkwall. The main villa, dated 1829, is a two-storey building over a basement, set on a near-symmetrical square plan with a piended roof. It is constructed of squared and snecked rubble stone with polished sandstone ashlar dressings. A band course separates the basement from the ground floor, and an eaves course runs along the top. The west (entrance) elevation features a central porch with a timber-panelled door and fanlight. The south (garden) elevation has a bracketed balcony over a ground-floor window. The east elevation has windows at each floor in each bay, with the central ground-floor window blocked. The north (rear) elevation incorporates a projecting ancillary range with a lean-to porch. The villa has long and short margins to the window openings, stone canopies over the taller ground floor windows, and long and short quoins with raised angles. It originally had lying-pane timber sash and case windows, a grey slate roof, coped ashlar stacks, and cast-iron rainwater goods. The interior was not inspected in 1998.

Adjoining the main villa to the north is a single-storey and attic L-plan coach house, constructed of harl-pointed rubble with squared rubble and sandstone ashlar dressings. Further north is a detached L-plan stable and byre, dating back to approximately 1715, which is also harled. The principal (east) elevation of the stable and byre is dominated by a depressed-arched cart entrance with boarded doors, an attic window above, 2-leaf sliding doors, a round-arched hay-loft door and a date panel reading “1829”. The west (rear) elevation is irregularly fenestrated with key-hole slit and blocked pointed arched openings. It has fixed and sash and case timber windows, lying-pane windows to the rear, a grey slate roof, stone ridge and skews, a tall rubble ridge stack, and cast-iron rainwater goods. The interior of the stable and byre was also not inspected in 1998.

A roughly rectangular walled garden lies to the south of the villa, enclosed by rubble walls with a convex curved north wall. A lean-to rubble shed is situated at the southwest angle, with a traditional stone slated roof.