Bathgate, 52 Hopetoun Street

Hopetoun Street

The principal thoroughfare through Bathgate which, joined to North Bridge Street, forms the boundary between 19th-century Bathgate and the older town to the north. Traces of former prosperity and gentility survive - No 52, with its recessed Doric porch, pilasters and fluted lintel, and the two fine pilastered doors of Whyte's Bar.

The junction with George Street, once graced by the cast-iron McLagan fountain (now re-erected in the Steelyard - its removal led to the nickname of the fountain-less cross), was greeted by a widening marked by a splendid curving corner Royal Bank of Scotland, with corniced windows, balustraded porch and great chimneystack; now truncated, all detail cloured off, leaving neutered windows gaping through chocolate-coloured harl. The New Royal Bar, at the junction of North Bridge Street, has a fine consoled and pedimented corner door. Bank of Scotland, c.1950, an elegant essay in late 1930s classical, has stair-tower at one end graced by flagpole, leading to two plain office storeys above.

Taken from "West Lothian: An Illustrated Architectural Guide", by Stuart Eydmann, Richard Jaques and Charles McKean, 2008. Published by the Rutland Press http://www.rias.org.uk