Buness House, Baltasound, Unst

Buness House, Baltasound, Unst

This is a 2-storey traditional Laird's house of late 17th-century origin, substantially altered in the 19th century and again in the mid 20th century. The main building comprises six bays in near-symmetrical arrangement, with a wing projecting north at the east end to form an L-shaped plan. The walls are harled and cement-rendered with cement margins to the windows.

The south-facing principal elevation is near-symmetrical with regular fenestration across each bay, though a modern gabled conservatory obscures two bays at ground level to the left of centre. The west gable features a single-storey porch advanced and offset to the right, with a vertically-boarded timber door centred in the south gable. A single window at first floor sits to the left in the principal gable behind. The north rear elevation is asymmetrical, with bipartite and narrow windows at ground floor in the bays to the right of centre and the outer right bay; a single window appears at first floor to the right of centre. A modern two-storey stair wing projects west to the left, stepping down to a single storey and attic garage. The east elevation shows the two-bay gable of the original house to the outer left with windows at ground and first floor in the right bay only, with the modern stair wing and garage recessed to the right.

The windows are predominantly timber sash and case with four panes, except for plate glass sashes with timber mullion to the bipartite window, two-pane fixed-lights to the porch, and modern glazing to the north wing. The roof features purple-grey slate pitches over the older work and porch. Stugged sandstone ashlar stacks rise to the north and south gables and the central ridge, all with stone copes and circular cans. Crowstepped skews flank the west and east gables, with lead-covered skew copes flanking the central stack.

A semicircular rubble dwarf wall fronts the principal elevation, terminated adjacent to the elevation by square piers with pyramidal finials.

The garden and boundary walls consist of walled enclosures in harl-pointed and drystone rubble. The western entrance features square rubble gatepiers with stepped caps and ball finials, with a simple wrought-iron gate. Walled enclosures flank the approach to the house, continuing as a boundary wall curving north to meet the coach house at the east. The east gates comprise square stugged sandstone piers with stepped caps surmounted by pyramidal finials, with two-leaf vertically-boarded timber gates. Three walled gardens to the northwest of the house are linked by a common entrance gate consisting of a symmetrical double gateway with brick coping swept up to a ball finial at the apex.

The former coach house is a five-bay gabled rectangular structure of harl-pointed rubble, aligned between the boundary wall and the road. It has blank walls to the south and west with a modern door to the north gable. The symmetrical east elevation shows rubble-infilled narrow windows to the centre and outer bays, and vertically-boarded timber doors in the bays flanking the centre. It now has a modern corrugated sheet roof with concrete skew-copes.

The stable and boat house form a pair of barns of rhomboid plan in random rubble, with a double gable facing the road to the east. The stable to the south has a two-leaf vertically-boarded timber door to the east gable, a small four-pane fixed-light offset to the left in the west gable, and a vertically-boarded timber door in the north re-entrant angle. It retains a stone slab roof with harl-pointed rubble skew-copes. The boat house to the north, which was roofless as of 1997, is of shorter length and aligned with a doorway in the east gable. A gate adjoins the north end of the east gable, comprising a square harl-pointed rubble pier with a rubble stile adjacent to the north.

At the beach to the east of the coach house stands a noost—a drystone rubble U-plan wall enclosing the noost area, open to the east with a concrete slip to the water. To the north it is bounded by a large concrete-coped rubble pier extending into the water and terminated by a slipway.