East Outbuilding, Hillside Free Church Manse, Baliasta, Unst

Group comprising substantial remains of former classical Free Church dated 1843, linked by formal arrangement of walls to contemporary symmetrical 2-storey 3-bay former manse with outbuildings to NW.

CHURCH: currently roofless 3 x 3 bay hall church of rectangular plan with vestry wing projecting to N. Base course, margined windows with projecting cills. Harled rubble walls with droved sandstone ashlar dressings and margins.

S (ENTRANCE) GABLE: symmetrical 3-bay, wide, shallow gable; centre bay slightly advanced, round-arched entrance door with dated keystone, armorial panel with inscription centred in gablehead above, rising to harled plinth surmounted by pedimented droved ashlar bellcote. Regular fenestration in flanking bays.

E AND W ELEVATIONS: symmetrical, with 3 widely-spaced regularly-fenestrated bays.

N (REAR) GABLE: bipartite window in N gable of wing projecting at centre; 2-bay side elevations, doors in re-entrant angle with principal gable.

Harled and coped stack to apex of N gable.

MANSE: 2-storey 3-bay symmetrical manse with gabled 2-storey wing to N (rear) forming T-plan. Harled walls with droved sandstone ashlar margins to windows and doors.

S (PRINCIPAL) ELEVATION: panelled and glazed timber entrance door with 5-pane fanlight at ground in centre bay; regular fenestration in flanking bays and at 1st floor.

W GABLE: single window at ground to left.

N (REAR) ELEVATION: blank elevation with wing advanced roughly at centre; blank N gable, infilled doors at ground in E side, window and door at ground and single window at 1st floor in W side; later 2-storey infill to W re-entrant angle.

Timber sash and case windows; plate glass to principal range, 4-pane to infill, 9-pane surviving to wing. Grey slate roof with cement-rendered skew copes; harled gablehead stacks, all coped with circular cans.

INTERIOR: many earlier 19th century fittings surviving including 6-panel doors, panelled shutters and cupboard doors at 1st floor. Timber stair with turned spindles to balustrade, inter-war chimneypieces to downstairs rooms, delicate reeded timber chimneypiece to drawing room at 1st floor.

OUTBUILDINGS: pair of single storey, 3-bay shallow-gabled outbuildings, aligned E-W with small square mono-pitch building centred between. Irregularly-fenestrated elevations, felt-roofed W building extended to W; E building roofless.

BOUNDARY AND GARDEN WALLS, AND GATEPIERS: formal arrangement of random rubble walls enclosing churchyard, bounded to W by pleasance to manse (centring N side), flanked in turn by small walled enclosures. Cement-rendered and lined square gatepiers with pyramidal caps centring S walls of pleasance and churchyard and leading to wall-lined approach, terminated to S by square rubble gatepiers.