Edinburgh, Camus Avenue, Comiston House

188. Comiston House, Camus Avenue.

[NT26NW 1] All that survives of the old house of Comiston is a late 16th-century angle-tower of rubble, which has been incorporated in the S.E. corner of the modern stables. This fragment has an external diameter of about 12ft. and stands to a height of nearly 20 ft. The upper part is set out on corbelling, below which may be seen two oval gun-loops facing respectively N.E. and S.E. An inscribed pediment of 1610, noted in the Inventory of Midlothian (No. 23) has disappeared (see Fig. 422 [SC 1469566]). The modern house [NT26NW 41], which only dates from 1815,is a neat country villa typical of its time, consisting of an oblong main block with a circular bay projecting from its N. side and a service wing from the E. The main block has a basement and two upper floors, while the wing has a storey less. The front, which faces S., is pedimented and has Ionic pilasters at the corners. In the centre is a flat Ionic porch, surmounted by a Venetian window and flanked by an oblong window on each side. The ground-floor windows have moulded architraves and cornices; those on the first floor have moulded architraves, and the remainder are plain. The entrance opens into a vestibule on the ground floor, flanked on the E. by the dining-room and on the W. by the library. The vestibule opens into a central transverse passage leading E. to the wing and containing the stair at its W. end. On the N. of the passage is the drawing room, which includes the circular N. bay and has recently been subdivided. Beside it are two bedrooms. There are seven bedrooms on the first floor, but none of the rooms is of special interest.

RCAHMS 1951, visited c.1941