Sir Basil Spence
Event ID 567332
Category Descriptive Accounts
Type Sir Basil Spence
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/567332
Building Notes
Plewlands House is a three-storey, L-shaped merchant's house with a round turreted stair tower. It is situated on the main street in South Queensferry. The walls are rubble stone and the roof is timber and covered in slate. By 1952 the house had fallen into a semi-derelict state and South Queensferry Council wanted to demolish it in order to improve a traffic bottleneck. However, the building was listed and it was found that demolition would have done little to ease the traffic situation. The National Trust for Scotland intervened and took over the house when the Pilgrim Trust provided a £4,000 grant towards the house's restoration.
Basil Spence & Partners were appointed architects for this work which included converting the house into seven flats. Hardie Glover was the partner in charge of the project. The job followed on from other rehabilitation work that the practice had carried out at other villages on the Lothian coast: Dunbar, Newhaven and Cramond. Work began in 1953 demolishing an adjoining building, rebuilding one wall and all of the chimneystacks. In October 1955 the first residents of the restored Plewlands House moved in after Lord Strathclyde officially opened the building.
Archive Details and Summary
The Sir Basil Spence Archive contains two press cuttings relating to Plewlands House. One summarises a council meeting in which Spence's proposals for the building were outlined. The other, from 1954, quotes that Spence said he 'wanted to see more done to preserve gems of Scotland's old-time domestic architecture'.
The Spence Glover & Ferguson Collection, also held at RCAHMS, contains five photographs showing Plewlands House prior to reconstruction and 19 working drawings. These include plans as existing and showing alterations.
This text was written as one of the outputs of the Sir Basil Spence Archive Project, supported by the Heritage Lottery Fund, 2005-08.
