Milton Farmhouse

Milton Farmhouse

Milton Farm and Belltree House is a late 18th century U-plan building of 2 storeys with small single storey wings, built as part of the Buchanan Castle Estate of the Dukes of Montrose. It is now subdivided into two dwellings. The building is notable for its unusual feature of two principal entrance elevations, suggesting a different original use or perhaps dual occupation. Nineteenth-century maps identify the building as an inn. It occupies a prominent position slightly set back from the main road through Milton of Buchanan. Directly to the rear stands The Stables, a rectangular-plan 2-storey building of the same period, now converted to residential use. Both Milton Farm, Belltree House and The Stables are largely unaltered and valued for their contribution to the streetscape.

The 3-bay south elevation overlooks the road and is symmetrical, featuring a projecting pedimented porch containing a round-headed doorway. The windows are treated distinctively with central mullions; the smaller first-floor windows are horizontally sliding sash and case windows. To the east this elevation is continued by a single bay single-storey addition, probably dating from the early 19th century.

The west elevation is almost identical to the south elevation, except that the porch lacks a pediment, the central first-floor window is blind, and the single-storey extension partly adjoins the north gable, projecting westwards. Although now largely obscured from the road by trees and bushes, the west elevation would originally have been clearly visible to travellers approaching from the west, which may explain the existence of two entrance elevations.

The rear north elevation is blank except for a mullioned first-floor window in the recessed central section.

Interior

Milton Farm is accessed via the south doorway and occupies most of the south and east ranges, except for the west ground-floor room. It contains a stone geometric stair and several classical timber chimneypieces, two of oversized proportions, together with round-arched cast-iron grates on both ground and first floors. Two first-floor rooms retain timber-boarded ceilings.

Belltree House is accessed via the west doorway. The southernmost ground-floor room retains a round-arched cast-iron gate and a timber chimneypiece.

Materials

The building is constructed of random rubble, mostly white-painted, with harling to the rear and parts of the side elevations. The quoins and margins are droved. Windows are timber sash and case, predominantly 12-pane glazing to the ground floor and 18-pane glazing to the first floor, with timber panelled doors. The roofs are piended with graded slates. Ridge stacks are corniced to the west and east ranges, with a tall wallhead stack to the rear and a shouldered wallhead stack to the west single-storey wing; circular cans are present.

The Stables

A substantial late 18th century harled farm building, converted to residential use in the late 20th century. It is 2 storeys high with a 6-bay front south elevation, with doorways to the second and last bays from the left. The north gable has a single-storey lean-to addition with the roof extending down from eaves level. To the rear west a later lean-to addition extends almost the full length of the elevation. Windows are 12-pane timber sash and case. The roof is pitched and slated. The interior was not accessed during the 2005 resurvey but is believed to be largely modernised.