Stirling, Torbrex

NS79SE 17 78947 92168

Torbrex Farm. This house, now a roofless shell, stands just outside the N outskirts of Torbrex village (No.259). It is rectangular on plan (fig.128), measuring 34ft 6in by 20ft over walls 2ft 6in and 2ft thick respectively in gables and sides. Its original height was two storeys and an attic, but it was later raised to three storeys and an attic. The masonry is rubble, containing many small water-worn boulders, and the floors were joisted. Most of the old walling survives except on the S side, where it has been entirely removed above the first-floor level. The quoins on this side are dressed with a backset margin, but on the N this feature occurs only in the newer masonry above the old wall-head. On neither the old nor the new wall-head is there an eaves-course. The present W gable is finished with tabling, as is also the S rake of the E gable, but the N rake at this end is topped with crow-steps which end in an ogival skewput. Below this skewput a stone with the intials I W and B B has been inserted upside down. The walls have been harled externally and plastered internally.

The original block appears to date from the 17th, the major alterations from the beginning of the 18th, and a few minor modifications from the 19th century. This house appears to have been a residence of the family of Wordie of Torbrex, and the initials quoted above are probably those of John Wordie, 4th of Torbrex, and his wide Barbara Bennet, whom he married in 1701.

In the farm-steading, which adjoins the house on the W, a doorway and two windows are treated with backset margins and rounded arrises, in the same manner as the first-floor window described above. The walling in which they occur may therefore be assigned to the early 18th century, but the greater part of the steading is later and probably dates from some time in the century following.

RCAHMS 1963, visited 1955

Torbrex Farm, at NS 7895 9216, has been entirely demolished.

Visited by OS (WDJ) 9 January 1964