Former Duns Sheriff Court, 8 Newtown Street

The former Duns Sheriff Court, located at 8 Newtown Street, was built around 1855 with a courtroom addition added to the rear around 1904, along with later alterations. This symmetrical, two-storey, three-bay building features a Tudor-Jacobean style on its principal elevation. A large flat-roofed addition was constructed to the east between 1967 and 1969, but it is not considered of interest in listing terms. The building is made of stugged, squared, and snecked cream sandstone with ashlar dressings.

There are steps leading up to the entrance, which has a coped ashlar balustrade and piers. The central entrance features a two-leaf panelled door set in a moulded Tudor-arched doorcase. The windows are tripartite, with moulded ashlar mullions and transoms, and hoodmoulds integrated into the moulded lintel course at the ground floor. The first floor windows have a cill course and lintel course, with Tudor-arched upper lights. The outer bays have shouldered gables with finials, while the centre has a smaller gable with a blank shield. The rear includes a seven-bay, M-gabled wing that served as the former courtroom, featuring corbelled skewputts and connected to the Newtown Street block by a two-storey linking block.

The windows throughout the building include sash and case as well as casement types in timber frames. The front elevation has horizontal panes, while the rear has 12-pane glazing. The roof is covered with grey slates arranged in fish scale courses on the front pitch, and the rear has ashlar-coped skews. Coped ashlar stacks with octagonal cans and decorative cast iron rainwater heads complete the exterior.

The interior, as seen in 2014, has undergone significant remodelling and alterations, including the replacement of courtroom furniture around 1989 to meet the evolving needs of the building and the court service. Additionally, there is a low ashlar boundary wall along Newtown Street, topped with saddleback coping.