Dunselma, Strone

Dunselma, built in 1884–1886, is a sailing lodge constructed for James Coats Junior to designs by architects Rennison and Scott. The house and its associated buildings represent the ultimate expression of conspicuous wealth accumulated by late 19th-century industrialists.

The main house follows a roughly L-plan and rises 3 to 4 storeys, dominated by a prominent 4-stage tower at its centre. The building is a catalogue of Baronial features and stands as an excellent example of a late 19th-century villa—deliberately prominent, remarkably extravagant, and notable for its collection of refined interior, exterior and ancillary features. Dunselma rises above Strone point and is prominent from all sides, particularly when viewed from Dunoon, where it dwarfs the other buildings at Strone.

The entrance elevation faces west and features the central 4-stage tower, which is machicolated and crenellated with a circular ogee-domed stair turret and a rectangular aediculed window. The main door sits in the tower's base between splayed balustrades, round-arched with a rope hood-mould. To the left, the house steps back to 2 storeys with a corbelled corner turret. To the right is a crowstepped gable above a projecting corner bay. The south elevation overlooks Loch Long and the Holy Loch. A massive crowstepped ashlar bay maximises these views, containing a five-light canted mullioned and transomed window on the main floor and a tripartite window above, with a further aediculed window in the gable apex. The east elevation also exploits the views, featuring a large mullioned and transomed window over a canted bay within a central crowstepped bay. The remainder of the exterior displays an irregular collection of fenestration interspersed with corbels, stepped corbel-tables, rope-mouldings and decorative rain-spouts.

The interior contains many features of note. The entrance hall is finished with a mosaic floor, figurative stained glass by J.J. Kier depicting Terpsichore and the Spirits of Hospitality, shell alcoves, and a scrumbled ceiling with a green man central boss. The main stair is of hardwood with amphora balusters and urn finials to the newels. The main stair window is of particular quality, probably also by Kier, displaying Jacobean strapwork patterns, the names of three of Coats' yachts, and three explorers—Vasco da Gama, Columbus and Sir Francis Drake. The main reception rooms feature decorative plaster ceilings, timber and marble chimneypieces, and panelled walls. The large billiard room is entirely timber-boarded. The tower contains a groin-vaulted observation room with windows depicting Galileo, Copernicus and Urania, the muse of Astronomy.

The exterior is constructed of painted harled rubble with sandstone dressings, hardwood sash and case windows, and a glazed hardwood main door. The pitched slate roofs have stone ridges, a lead ogee dome, stone stacks and clay cans. Rainwater goods and decorative spouts are cast iron.

Immediately to the northeast of Dunselma, against the boundary wall, stands a single-storey masonry outbuilding with an unusual cast iron canopy of exceptional quality. The verandah comprises components from the foundry of W. MacFarlane and Co., including a foliate pediment and a frieze of five-pointed stars.

Two entrances serve the property. At the shore road north of the lodge are square-plan ashlar gatepiers with later replacement gates, connected to the house by an entrance road that wound uphill in a series of terraces, flanked by stretches of wrought iron railings on a low ashlar-coped wall. The second entrance lies immediately west of the house through square ashlar gatepiers. North of the house, fronting the High Road, is a high harled and ashlar-coped boundary wall. South of the house, a series of stone steps descend to the former tennis court.