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Summary

Description

James Lessels, 1886. Substantial, asymmetrical Scots Baronial 3-storey and attic, 3-bay house (now subdivided); set back from street behind iron-railed low coped wall. Central curved bay in re-entrant angle from 1st floor carried above eaves as turret with decorative machicolations, fish-scale slated conical roof and baluster finial. Bull-faced squared and snecked sandstone with polished dressings, rubble to rear.

N (JEFFREY STREET) ELEVATION: timber-panelled single-leaf door to centre (original brass door handle); plate glass fanlight in roll-moulded shoulder-arched surround below balustraded 1st floor balcony; mullioned and transomed window with bowed glass to 1st floor of turret. Advanced crow-stepped gable to right with 4-light transomed window to ground; pentice-roofed mullioned and transomed oriel corbelled out at 1st floor. Kingposted timber dormer to attic at left.

W ELEVATION: crow-stepped advanced gable; segmental-pedimented dormer. Modern timber door to No 41; further single storey wing with timber door.

S (REAR) ELEVATION: advanced plain gable; bipartite windows; recessed section with irregular fenestration. Single storey wing; rear timber single-leaf door to garden; 2 small windows.

Plate glass in timber sash and case windows. Grey slate roofs; flat roof to single storey rear wing. Corniced gable and wallhead stacks; moulded octagonal clay cans. Cast-iron rainwater goods.

INTERIOR: vestibule with half-glazed door; red herringbone-tiled hallway; dado rail; cornicing, brackets and consoles; floor level alcove; plain cornicing in study and committee rooms, timber architraves and shutters; scale and platt stair from ground to 2nd floor (winders at 2nd) with painted balusters (banister and newels unpainted); large rectangular attic cupola. 1st floor drawing room (now divided into 2 rooms) with timber panelled architraves and dado; ornate shell-moulded cornice; pale grey marble torus-moulded chimneypiece with bay leaf, berry and ribbon carving; blue and white 'Delft' tiled slip. 2nd floor bedroom pale grey plain chimneypiece; cast-iron grate; glazed tile hearth.

BOUNDARY WALLS: plain iron gate and railings set on low coped wall to front. High, coped random rubble boundary wall running NW to SE to right of house.

Statement of Special Interest

Built as a clergy residence for Old St Paul's Church, also in Jeffrey Street (separately listed), and still in use as such. The Reverend Reginald Mitchell-Innes and his aunt Cornelia Dick Lauder, who had a bedroom designated for her (marked on plans), funded the building of Lauder House. This bedroom, the dining room below and a further ground floor room no longer exist due to the insertion of a large, unsympathetic stairwell to service the rear of the building, converted into a separate flat in 1972. Only 2 chimneypieces survive but much of the timberwork, in the form of doors and shutters, does and the original stair is well preserved. Alterations are confined to one area of the interior; the exterior remains intact.

References

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