The Courthouse, High Street, Peebles

The Courthouse in Peebles was designed by Thomas Brown II and constructed between 1844 and 1848, with significant interior alterations made by Kinnear and Dick Peddie in 1892. This former courthouse and jail is a two-storey building (four storeys at the rear) with an irregular plan, designed in the Jacobean style. It is prominently located at the western end of the High Street, on ground that slopes down towards the river at the back.

The building is made of cream sandstone ashlar and features chamfered reveals, hood moulds, and a moulded string course between the ground and first floors. It has a parapet with shallow pilasters that end in tall octagonal stacks with chamfered bases and heavy coping. The central entrance bay is gabled and includes a round-arched window in the gablehead. The first floor has tripartite windows, and the gabled bay on the south elevation is topped with an apex finial that rises from a corbelled shaft with chamfered corners. The rear elevation features Gothic windows in the re-entrant angle, while the rear itself is constructed of whinstone rubble. Most of the windows have a 12-pane glazing pattern set in timber sash and case frames, and the roof is covered with grey slates.

At the back of the building, there are high rubble boundary walls with a rounded cope.

The interior was partially observed in 2014 and includes a Jacobean plasterwork ceiling in the former court on the first floor. The entrance vestibule features moulded surrounds to the inner doorway with round-arched glazed sections. An adjoining room has a dentiled plasterwork ceiling. The centre of the building contains an open well staircase with barley-twist bannisters and a cupola. The former basement cells have segmental-arched ceilings and metal doors.