Cheeklaw House, Duns

Cheeklaw House is an earlier 19th-century house with additions dating to circa 1850, and subsequent alterations. It is a two-storey, five-bay structure. The house is constructed of sandstone; the rubble stone of the west elevation is rendered on the right side of the south elevation, and finished with finely dressed, droved snecked ashlar on the left side of the south elevation. The rear is partly harled and rendered.

The south elevation displays three bays of the original house to the right. A flight of three steps leads to a central doorway, featuring a diamond-glazed upper panel and a fanlight above, with a window in the gablehead above. Windows are in each flanking bay, and first-floor windows are positioned above, breaking the eaves with gabled dormerheads. A taller, two-bay, piend-roofed addition from the 19th century is present on the right, with two steps leading to a panelled door, featuring a diamond-pane fanlight, and a first-floor window above. A single-storey, piend-roofed, canted window is situated at ground level in the bay to the left, with a first-floor window above.

The west elevation has windows at ground and first floor level in the extreme outer bays. The north elevation shows a 19th-century addition that projects forward with a ground-floor window approximately centre, a later door with a glazed panel to the left, and a first-floor window to the outer left. A later two-storey monopitched rendered addition extends from the return wall. There are ground floor windows in the bay to centre and to the right of the earlier section. Single-storey outbuildings project to the north from the outer left.

The west elevation of the outbuildings features grouped bays of two or three. A window is centrally positioned within a three-bay group, alongside a boarded double door in the bay to the left and a modern glazed door with a window to the outer right. A two-bay group is advanced and gabled, with a centre window and a semicircular opening in the gablehead; a boarded door is positioned to the outer left. A monopitch modern glazed addition extends to the outer left.

The windows are predominantly 12-pane sash and case, with the exception of the four-pane timber sash and case windows to the canted window on the south elevation and the nine-pane timber sash and case window on the west elevation of the outbuildings' central bay of a two-bay group. The roofs are slate covered, with brick gablehead stacks to the earlier section, and a rendered and brick wallhead stack to the west elevation.

Inside the house, shutters remain in situ, and there’s a skylight to the staircase (possibly a later addition). The outbuildings retain stabling stalls within the two-bay group. A rubble boundary wall with round coping is present to the east.