Head Post Office, High Street, Galashiels

HM Office of Works (Probably W W Richardson), dated 1894. 2-storey, 7-bay Free Renaissance Post Office with prominent octagonal corner towers. Single-storey sorting offices to rear. Polished buff sandstone ashlar to front and returns, brick to sides and rear. Base course, moulded sill courses, cornice at first floor level, corbelled frieze with carved panels and eaves cornice, blocking course. Banded ashlar to ground floor. Continuous vertical bands at window surrounds. Square-headed ground floor windows, round-arched to upper floor with raised architraves and projecting keystones.

FRONT (SW) ELEVATION: symmetrical. Projecting central pedimented porch with ionic surrounds and banded archway. Pedimented central armorial panel with Doric pilasters rising above eaves. Octagonal slated roofs to corner towers.

4-pane fixed light and casement windows with palmette details and to front elevation. Timber sash and case windows to rear. Purple slate roof, ashlar skews. Vertically-banded and corniced gable-head stacks. Cast iron rainwater goods with decorative hoppers.

INTERIOR: largely modernised internally. Internal layout largely intact. Timber-lined sorting office with wrought-iron truss roof.