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Tayside & East Fife Cases Panels updated 09.08.04 The Tayside and North East Group has separate panels for the Council areas of Angus, Dundee, Perth and Kinross and for the North East district of Fife. Contact the national office for further details. Dundee Cases Panel To date the panel has reviewed approximately 30 applications, including shop front facades, replacement windows, and changes of use from commercial to residential premises. Many of the applications fall within conservation areas but fortunately we have been supplied with conservation area appraisals that are proving helpful in determining the context for individual applications. In December we spent a large amount of time analysing the application for the restoration and conversion to a backpackers' hostel for the set of five buildings that make up the category A listed Gardyne's Land grouping (which also happens to be the venue of our panel meetings!). These meticulous and complex plans included comprehensive details on materials and restoration techniques and were warmly received by the panel. We did, however, make a number of comments, including that of the design of the copper clad wheelchair refuges to be located on the external walls of the building, extending into the courtyard. The panel felt that these refuges would be a dominant feature within the courtyard and would obscure too much original fabric. Compliance with building regulations will probably necessitate the retention of these refuges, but we are hopeful that the design will be altered to become less intrusive in what is the best surviving merchant's house courtyard in Dundee. The panel is very much in its infancy but hopes to build a strong relationship with the planning officers at Dundee City Council through regular contact. Finally, many thanks to the new panel members. Should anyone be interested in joining this panel, we would warmly welcome further members. Please contact me if you are interested in helping out for a couple of hours on a weekly basis. Sarah Kettles
St Leonard's School, St Andrews, is desperate to realise the value of some of its surplus land and buildings. At present one residence has been sold and is being converted into flats, applications have been submitted for two other sites for blocks of flats, and a remaining area of land is under consideration as a possible site for the new district hospital. Meanwhile there are at least another four sites within St Andrews on which developers hope to build blocks of flats - one adjacent to the West Port and one in Bridge Street which have now been approved, and two in the Fleming Place area which are under consideration. In all the above 'flat' developments this panel has been particularly active not only commenting on the architecture but also their density. There is no doubt that the cost of building sites in St Andrews is so high that developers resort to all manner of design ploys in order to pack in the maximum number of units. Initially the overall height, the extent, and the parking facilities all tend to exceed acceptable local guidelines. At the same time additional traffic generated by new concentrations of flats could prove dangerous when introduced into existing busy roadways. Glen L Pride Perth & Kinross Cases Panel The castle itself is an extremely large and impressive edifice, based on the original stronghold of the Campbells of Breadalbane known as Balloch. It has been pointed out that this was the farthest east of a chain of castles guarding the Glenorchy estates, beginning in the west with Ardmaddy and Barcaldine in Argyll. Taymouth has a fairly complicated building history, culminating in what we see today and beginning with the central block and tower, designed by A & J Elliott and built between 1806 and 1809. This is the so-called 'Tea Cadie' designed with more than a passing reference to the rival Campbell seat at Inveraray. Next came the long low extension to the east by William Atkinson (1818-21). And lastly, the huge western block, designed by James Gillespie Graham, with the assistance, for the interiors, of his friend and colleague, A W N Pugin. This was completed in 1834. Although now lying empty, the interiors of the castle are still very impressive, particularly the central staircase hall and lantern, the Barons Hall, the library (fitted out by Trotter & Co) and the Banner Hall, a fantastic chapel-like link between the west and main buildings. There are also rooms specially created for Victoria and Albert on their famous visit in 1842. But the castle is not all. It is set within a magnificent designed landscape which in its day must have been one of the most impressive in Scotland, if not in the British Isles. It was first laid out to designs by William Adam in 1720, altered several times in the 18th century and again in the mid 19th century. Today, much of the park is laid out as a golf course, and sadly much of the designed landscape has gone and many of the remaining features are derelict (Inventory p.265). Still to be seen are the Dairy (c.l838) built of white quartz, -the Chinese Bridge, which crosses the Tay at the back of the castle, Rock Lodge on the north side of the river, and the remarkable Maxwell's Temple - a replica of Queen Eleanor's Cross, designed by Atkinson in 1831. All these are listed category A. Taking the castle and all that goes with it, our cases panel will have plenty to consider in the weeks and months ahead. Since the property was sold in 1922, it has been successively an hotel and golf course, a Polish army wartime hospital, a Civil Defence College and briefly leased to a school. Since then, it has been empty. We can't help feeling that, in a real sense, the present proposals represent a last chance for this sleeping beauty by the banks of the Tay. Since writing the above there has been a long period of uncertainty regarding the future of Taymouth Castle and the designed landscape around it. However, on 9 January 2004 a planning application to Perth and Kinross Council appeared which, if granted and carried out, would transform the property into a 'world class hotel and leisure resort', costing an estimated £80 million. Apart from restoration work on the castle itself, there would be a new north wing incorporating some 72 suites, a new spa within the Newhall Kennels building, a considerable number of new 'lodges' and 'fractional ownership houses' in various locations, 16 staff houses and an equestrian centre. The developers are Hotels International Ltd., operating as the Four Seasons Group. Fergus Harris References: |
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