Ward 11, Dykebar Hospital, Grahamston Road, Paisley

Ward 11, Dykebar Hospital, Grahamston Road, Paisley

This is a former asylum site designed by Thomas Graham Abercrombie in 1909 and 1914, comprising several buildings arranged on a wooded, semi-rural site close to a main road. The complex includes a lodge, administration building, wards, former nurses' home, villas and associated service buildings, all executed in the Edwardian Baroque style.

All buildings are constructed of red sandstone with ashlar margins, and the majority have base courses. Raised margins surround many of the windows. The buildings display a variety of windows including multi-pane timber sash and case windows and some non-traditional windows, with many dormers being flat-roofed. The roofs are all in grey slate with cast-iron rainwater goods, and several buildings feature distinctive decorative roof ventilators and tall slim coped stacks.

Administration Building and Wards 16, 17, 19 and 20 (1909) form the centrepiece of the site. This is a two-storey and attic, nine-bay symmetrical building with single-storey splayed-plan wards to the east and west, forming an approximate butterfly-plan complex. The south entrance elevation features a rusticated doorpiece with broken segmental-arched pediment and a dentilled cornice. The central five bays are flanked by advanced pyramid-roofed staircase pavilions, with canted window bays and pediments to the end bays. The eastern ward wing has a canted entrance bay with decorative roof ventilator above. Some later 20th-century flat-roofed extensions have been added. The buildings are internally linked throughout. Decorative interior features include timber panelling, fire surrounds and cornicing.

The Former Nurses' Home (1914) is a two-storey and attic, nine-bay symmetrical building (now offices as of 2013) with a central Ionic pilastered doorpiece at the entrance. The north elevation has gabled end bays, whilst the south elevation features a central two-storey canted window bay. Most dormers are flat-roofed.

Wards 11, 12 and Villas 20 and 22 are similar in design. Ward 11, Villa 20 and Villa 22 date from 1909, whilst Ward 12 dates from 1914. These are two-storey and attic, eight-bay former wards with projecting two-bay outer gables on entrance elevations with a linking verandah. Each has a projecting gabled bay at the rear with a round-arched window to the upper storey. Some windows have segmental-arched cornices. Villas 20 and 22, located to the far west of the site, are in poor condition.

Ward 15 (1909) is a two-storey and attic, nine-bay asymmetrical former ward (now offices as of 2013) with advanced gabled end bays with linking verandah. It has pedimented dormers.

Ward 14 is a twelve-bay, largely symmetrical office building comprising a two-storey gabled entrance bay, a square-plan pyramidal-roofed bay immediately to the east, long single-storey wings extending to east and west, and advanced gabled end bays. There is a dentilled corbelled cornice over the entrance.

The Former Station and Stores comprise three two-storey gabled ranges with additional single-storey buildings forming an approximately rectangular plan complex with an open canopy over the road to the north. This canopy originally covered the railway. Two of the ranges face east with the third range oriented north to south to the west. The east elevation has three large round-arched windows, whilst the south elevation has a pair of round-arched windows. The interior features a timber and glass partition with small-pane glazing to the upper section and a timber and glass door to the ground.

The Workshops and Laundry comprise a single-storey row of workshops with a low wall and metal railings to the south, and a gabled laundry range to the east with a tall brick stack. A gabled single-storey former mortuary to the far west has decorative skewputts and deep-set windows, with the laundry having a corrugated iron roof.

The Lodge, dated 1908, is a single-storey and attic, largely square-plan building with an advanced gable to the north featuring a canted bay window and a prominent central chimney stack.

The Gates, Gatepiers and Quadrant Walls comprise square-plan gatepiers flanking the driveway with a round-arched pedestrian gate to the south. Each pier is topped by an urn, and there is a quadrant wall to the south with some metal railings.