5-9 Victoria Street, Stromness

5-9 Victoria Street in Stromness is a former Masonic Lodge built in 1889, featuring later alterations. This two-storey, three-bay (five-bay at ground level) building showcases an asymmetrical Scots Jacobean style, with a slightly advanced two-bay crow-stepped gabled block on the left, situated on rising ground to the west (rear). The exterior is constructed of stugged and snecked red sandstone ashlar, accented with polished and tooled cream ashlar dressings. It has a base course and a string course that acts as hood moulds over the openings on both the ground and first floors. The reveals of the openings are ovolo-moulded, and there are stone mullions for the bipartite windows, along with long and short margins and quoins.

On the east (principal) elevation, the bays are arranged in a 2-1 grouping. The left two-bay group features a two-leaf shop door with storm doors to the left of centre, large rectangular fanlights, and picture windows on either side. To the right, there is a modern timber door with a fanlight above and blank panels beneath the hood moulds over the doors. Each bay on the first floor has a bipartite window. The gablehead displays a bordered inscription that reads 'Lodge Mercantile Marine No 453 Constd. Feb 6 1866', with a recessed date panel above in the finialled gablehead. The single bay block on the right has a bipartite window on each floor.

The west (rear) elevation is regularly fenestrated with three bays, each featuring a tall window on the first floor. The north (side) elevation has an irregular fenestration pattern, with a stone flight leading to a door at the first floor on the outer right, and a small square-headed louvered opening beneath a tall gablehead stack above.

The windows throughout are two-pane timber sash and case, with a picture window at ground level to the left. The roof is covered in grey slate, with a stone ridge, cavetto-moulded skewputts, and corniced ashlar gablehead stacks on the north and south sides. Cast-iron rainwater goods are also present.

Inside, the ground floor has been re-fitted as a shop, featuring timber boarded walls with a timber cornice and fitted shelving in the main shop area. There is a timber-framed glazed display cabinet/shop counter against the south wall, along with free-standing timber shop fixtures in the northern space.

Additionally, fleur-de-lys-headed railings are set in ashlar coping at the northwest angle of the property.