Levenbank, 12 High Street, Kinross

Levenbank is a two-storey classical villa with attic and basement, dating from the late 18th or early 19th century. The building is rectangular on plan with additions to the side and rear dating from the early to late 19th century. It is constructed in droved sandstone ashlar and sits behind a front garden with boundary wall, accessed by a private driveway from the High Street.

The main east elevation was originally three-bay but was extended by one bay to the south in the late 19th century in a similar style. An off-centre entrance has a pilastered doorpiece with a diamond-pane rectangular fanlight. A two-storey stable and hay loft is attached to the north. The rear west elevation is four-bay, rubble-built with a slate-roofed single-storey addition at ground floor level and an advanced central two-storey gable with chimneystack.

Windows are a mixture of glazing patterns in timber sash and case frames, predominantly 12-pane on the ground floor and four over four on the roof dormers and front and rear elevations. The main entrance has a timber-panelled door with a decorative-pane fanlight. The pitched slated roof features two end chimneystacks with thackstanes and one off-centre chimneystack, with modern clay chimney cans. Two piended-roofed dormer windows have four-pane sash and case windows, with a rear dormer containing a 20th century rooflight. Rainwater goods are predominantly plastic.

The interior contains decorative features from the late 18th or early 19th century, including timber-panelled shutters, ceiling roses, moulded cornicing and picture rails in the principal ground floor rooms. Decorative fire surrounds and iron fire inserts are present. A central curved timber staircase has painted iron balusters and painted timber handrail. The layout comprises principal rooms on either side of a central hallway with the curved staircase to the rear. The ground floor principal room was reconfigured in the late 20th century. A trap door with stair access leads to the basement.

The boundary wall fronting High Street is constructed in random rubble with dressed copings. The vehicular entrance is offset to the left with two rounded ashlar sandstone gatepiers with rounded caps. The gate is later 20th century decorative iron.

Levenbank first appears on Wood's Plan of the Town of Kinross of 1823 as a property belonging to Dr Annan. The map shows a largely rectangular-plan house with two adjoining rectangular outbuildings to the north, creating a roughly L-plan footprint, with a large enclosed front garden and carriageway to the south. The historic plot remains largely as it appears today within an L-shaped plot. In the early 19th century this area of Kinross was characterised by detached villas within their own plots.

The 1st Edition Ordnance Survey map (surveyed 1854, published 1857) shows Levenbank as an irregular-plan house with further extensions on the south and west elevations. The building appears to have been used as a doctor's residence throughout the 19th century. An 1888 advertisement in the Kinross-shire Advertiser described Levenbank as two storey and attic comprising two principal rooms, six bedrooms, bathroom, kitchen and other conveniences, with stable, hay loft, shed and large garden to the rear, noting it was a well-known doctor's residence then occupied by Doctor Smythe.

The 2nd Edition Ordnance Survey (25 inch) map (surveyed 1895, published 1896) shows a further row of outbuildings to the rear forming a U-shaped plan with the main house. By 1895 the house had been extended to the south, creating the current form with one additional bay to the left of the front elevation.