East Lodge, Stobo Castle Estate, Peebles

East Lodge, Stobo Castle Estate

East Lodge is a single-storey building with attic accommodation, built in the mid-19th century (before 1856) and later altered. It served as the principal gatelodge for Stobo Castle estate. The lodge is constructed in random whinstone with red sandstone ashlar margins and window mullions. It has an irregular two-bay plan, overhanging eaves with exposed rafter ends, and slated pitched roofs topped by ball finials on each gable.

The northeast elevation, which faces the entrance drive, features an advanced gable with a tripartite ground floor window and a single attic window above. To the left stands a gabled entrance porch with a replacement entrance door. The southeast elevation has a bipartite ground floor window and a single attic window. The building is topped by a central ridge chimneystack with a pair of square shafts set at an angle; one is topped by a clay pot while the other is truncated.

The rear southwest elevation has two single-storey rubble-built outshots of differing heights, one with a flat roof. A later uPVC conservatory has been added to the northwest elevation (excluded from the listing). The windows are non-traditional casements.

The property stands beside the B712 road between Stobo and Drumelzier, approximately 5.5 miles southwest of Peebles. Flanking the entrance drive immediately to the northeast are a pair of squared and coped ashlar stone gatepiers supporting decorative wrought iron gates featuring pin-wheel and fleur-de-lys finial motifs. Low stone quadrant walls, now topped with timber fencing, connect to a further pair of piers.

The lodge was built between 1832 and 1856, although its style suggests construction in the early 1850s. It replaced the Garden Lodge (dating from around 1812) as the main entrance to the estate. The Ordnance Survey Name Book of 1856–58 describes the East Lodge approach as the 'new approach' from the Peebles road, while the Garden Lodge entrance was termed the 'old approach'. The 1st Edition Ordnance Survey map of 1856 shows a semi-circular entranceway and approach drive leading westward through the estate policies past the Home Farm and Kennels toward Stobo Castle.

The building's footprint has altered since 1856, particularly at the rear with the addition of two single-storey outshots on the southwest elevation. The 2nd Edition Ordnance Survey map (revised 1897) shows the larger rectangular-plan outshot as separate from the main building, but the 3rd and later editions show a smaller connecting structure creating a larger overall footprint.

Stobo Castle was designed by Archibald and James Elliot and completed in 1811, replacing an earlier mansion. The Montgomery family owned the estate between 1766 and 1901. In the early 19th century, entrance lodges and ancillary estate buildings established Stobo as a typical residential and agricultural estate with an attractive designed landscape. The estate was later owned by cricketer Hylton Philipson and subsequently by the 10th Countess of Dysart, who lived at the castle until the mid-1960s. In 1972 the estate was divided and the castle contents sold at auction. East Lodge has been in separate ownership since the early 1970s. A conservatory was added in the late 1990s, and the internal layout was reconfigured in the late 2010s to enlarge a window opening and install two rooflights.