Interior-general view of paintings and armoury on First Floor landing and staircase

Description Interior-general view of paintings and armoury on First Floor landing and staircase

Date 1905

Collection Records of Bedford Lemere and Company, photographers, London, England

Catalogue Number SC 737100

Category On-line Digital Images

Copy of BL 19156

Scope and Content Grand Staircase, Yester House, East Lothian (now a private house) Yester House, the home of the Marquesses of Tweeddale, was built in the early 18th century as a Classical mansion to the design of James Smith & Alexander MacGill. Over the next 250 years, the interior was altered and improved by several of Scotland's most renowned architects, including William Adam and his sons, Robert & John, and the 19th-century architect, Robert Brown. The architectural photographer, Harry Bedford Lemere, was commissioned to photograph the house in 1905. The grand staircase, with walls and ceiling decorated with elegant 18th-century plasterwork by Joseph Enzer, leads to the principal apartments on the first floor. The walls, framed at the corners by Ionic-style pilasters rising from first-floor level, are lined with a collection of family portraits including that of Lord John Hay (right), younger brother of the 8th Marquess. Interesting family portraits on the stairwell included those of George, the 8th Marquess of Tweeddale, by the 19th-century Scottish painter, Henry Raeburn (now in the Scottish National Portrait Gallery, Edinburgh) and the Earl of Dunfermline by the 17th-century Flemish court painter, Van Dyke. Others works included portraits of John Napier of Merchiston, the famous 16th-century Edinburgh mathematician and inventor of logarithms, and the beautiful Countess of Roxburghe, daughter of John Hay, the 1st Marquess of Tweeddale, and known as 'Johnnie Hay's bonnie lass'. Source: RCAHMS contribution to SCRAN.

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/collection/737100

File Format (TIF) Tagged Image File Format bitmap