Tarbet Hotel, Tarbet

Tarbet Hotel is a 2-storey building with attic storeys, dating from 1850 but substantially remodelled in 1880. It stands as a rambling-plan Baronial villa with Jacobethan details, now operating as a hotel. The structure is built of squared and snecked whinstone rubble with ashlar margins and dressings, featuring chamfered reveals, a base course, quoins, string courses, and crowstepped gables throughout.

The southeast (entrance) elevation presents a near-symmetrical 5-bay design with a sixth bay to the outer right. A 3-stage entrance tower sits at the centre, with the lower two stages canted and corbelled up to a square upper stage. The entrance is framed by pilasters on a plinth with flanking windows, though these are now masked by an unsympathetic flat-roofed porch. The second stage contains three windows with the central window breaking the string course; a canted oriel rises above at centre with a parapet. The tower head has a castellated parapet on a corbelled course, raised to a shouldered pediment at the centre of each side bearing a blank plaque. Two narrow flanking bays form part of the original building; the bay to the right has a modern door while the bay to the left has a bipartite window at ground level with a window above and an attic storey featuring a crowstepped dormer breaking the eaves. Blind arcading appears in the gablehead, with the gable on the dormer to the right removed. Broad near-symmetrical flanking gables rise full-height from ground to first floor and contain canted windows; the left has a castellated blocking course while the right is larger with a balustrade. Windows at the centre of each gablehead carry strapwork detail. The outer right bay has a crowstepped dormer.

The northeast (side) elevation contains a 2-storey and attic 5-bay symmetrical range with a taller 3-bay L-plan block to the outer right. The symmetrical range features a full-height canted bay at centre corbelled to a crowstepped gable at the attic storey, with an 1880 datestone in strapwork above. Flanking segmental-headed windows break the eaves. Windows are symmetrically disposed at lower floors, with a decorative cast-iron balcony under the first floor windows. Broad 2-bay crowstepped gables flank either side with symmetrically disposed windows. The taller 3-bay block to the right contains a 4-stage round-tower entrance in the re-entrant angle with roll-moulded arrises at ground floor, French doors with large plate glass fanlight, and a similarly treated window to the left. A narrow bay to the outer left has a chamfered corner corbelled to square with a pepperpot turret. Stairs with scale and platt lead to a segmental-headed door with a consoled cornice above a first floor window and a window above that, plus a crowstepped dormer. An advanced gable to the outer right has chamfered corners at ground level and a cavetto moulding to square. A canted oriel with colonnettes dividing the windows and delicate cast-iron brattishing beneath a lead roof is present. A tripartite window above carries a relieving arch outlined in ashlar, with a window in the gablehead bearing strapwork. The left return has doors and windows symmetrically disposed with a small gabled dormer. A 3-bay asymmetrical right return features a blank bay to the outer left and a crowstepped gable breaking the eaves above the centre bay with symmetrically disposed windows. Modern concrete link blocks with a rendered modern block to the outer right are attached to the right side.

The southwest elevation comprises a 7-bay block consisting of a broad 2-bay gable to the outer right and a 5-bay symmetrical block. The broad gable to the outer right has windows symmetrically disposed, a single window in the gablehead, a crowstepped gable, and an apex stack. The 5-bay block is slightly recessed to the left with a full-height canted bay corbelled to a crowstepped gable at attic floor. Segmental-headed windows appear at ground and attic floors. Flanking 2-bay blocks include a boarded door with fanlight in the bay to the left, symmetrically disposed windows, and a crowstepped dormer breaking the eaves. A lower, long asymmetrical service range to the outer left has gables breaking the eaves at regular intervals.

Windows throughout are 8-pane, 4-pane, and plate glass timber sash and case designs, with some modern pivot windows. The roof is grey slate with fishscale slates to the pepperpot turret, corniced apex and ridge stacks, and decorative octagonal cans.

The interior features a vestibule with an oak staircase having an Ionic colonnette newel with macehead finial and barley-sugar balusters, topped with an egg and dart plaster cornice. An early 20th century oak screen leads to a modernised buttery. The hall is lit by etched and tinted stained glass windows, with additional stained glass over a modern door leading to modernised reception and bars.

A coaching inn has existed on the site from the 16th century, but the present hotel dates from 1850 with substantial alterations carried out in the 1880s.