Exterior
Large Victorian country house in Neo-Jacobean style. Of pale, finely-tooled sandstone ashlar blocks with smooth ashlar dressings; brick core and slate roofs. The house is of irregular plan, with a main, roughly rectangular block of 2 and 3 floors, and a lower 3-storey service section adjoining to the SE and partly enclosing a service court to the E, extended 1910-1915. The latter section incorporates a service accommodation wing in the manner of a chapel, with a Wrenaissance tower to the centre effectively forming an estate clock tower. Asymmetrical elevations with mullioned and transomed stone windows, mostly of cross-window type, though with some multi-light, single and 2-light windows; plain glazing throughout. The house sits on a moulded plinth, and has decorative string-courses to the first and second floors, the latter with strapwork relief decoration; pierced parapets with conjoined ovals, above a moulded cornice. Grouped chimney-stacks, mostly twos and threes, some with spiral decoration in the Tudor style, most octagonal; moulded bases and capping. Many of the original cast iron hoppers and downpipes survive, with relief crests to the former (though some modern replacements).
The entrance facade (N) has a main 3-storeyed block with a tower over the entrance to R; lower single-window block to the R beyond, with a lower canted wing advanced slightly to the L. The entrance has a single-storey Renaissance-style porte cochere advanced in front of a 4-storey tower containing the entrance on the ground floor. The porte cochere has a pedimented arch to the front with narrow flanking pierced sections having open oval oculi above; corner pilasters carry a strapwork frieze with carved head bosses; moulded cornice with pierced balustrade and geometric finials to the corners. Broad, depressed-arched sides and panelled oak roof with central glazed overlight. Above the central keystones on all 3 sides are portrait heads, including that of Robertson himself (on the R side). The latter has a relief-carved steam engine on the keystone below and, inscribed on the archivolt to either side, the motto: 'Ex Fumo Dare Lucem.' On the soffit of the keystone of the main, front arch, appears, in raised letters and figures: '1869 HR 1871. Ten-panel oak double doors via 4 stone steps.
The tower has a flat, balustraded roof with a raised cartouche in the centre with the monogram HR, together with the flanking figures 18 and 70. To the R of the tower is a lower 2-storey bay with 3-light transmullioned window to the ground floor and a canted oriel window to the first floor above. This has a parapet with decorative trefoil finials and is set off by a strapwork ogee gablet to the centre of the roof parapet behind. To the L of the tower, set back very slightly, is a 3-storey section of 3 bays, that to the L in the form of a narrow, advanced, rectangular stair tower. This has a semi-octagonal, medievalising ground-floor extrusion, and a squinched oriel in the corner above. Central lateral chimney, corbelled-out at first floor and slightly projecting; transmullioned windows to the ground and first floors flanking, with 2-light mullioned windows above. Beyond this section, to the L, is a lower 2-storey section with broad canted front having a projecting chimney. Cross-windows to the sides, those to the upper floor (billiard room), taller. Rising up behind the main facade to the L is a square water tower with faux-machicolated battlements and corner turrets. This has a C20 pyramidal felt roof, though originally had a surmounting ogee dome.
The 4-bay W elevation is of 2 storeys with cross windows, with a 3-storey advanced, canted bay occupying bay 2. The S elevation has a 4-bay main section, with a broad 2-storey bow window to the L having 3 cross-windows to each floor and an ogee gablet behind its bowed parapet. To the R of this is a bay with 5-light transmullioned windows to the ground and first floors (diminishing correspondingly in size), and a 3-light window to the second floor; cross-windows to the R on the ground and first floors, with 2-light window to the second. R of this is a 3-storey canted bay with single light windows and a segmentally-arched, chamfered garden door to the L (W) return. Adjoining this elevation at right-angles to the S is a lower 3-bay service section, with the right-hand gabled bay advanced and in the manner of a rectangular chapel with large central bell tower. The left-hand bays have an advanced 3-bay round-arched, parapetted loggia which slightly overlaps the gabled bay; the L arch is blind, whilst the remaining 2 form a garden recess; 3-light windows to the upper-floors set back above. The gabled wing has a round-arched entrance with steps up and keystone; part-glazed modern door. 2-light windows above with a surmounting ogee gable. The clock tower is square with a stone pyramidal roof having a surmounting bell cupola, itself with tall pyramidal roof; clock-face to each side with moulded label and geometric finial. The E side has a service court enclosed by high stone walls on the N and E sides, with rusticated gatepiers and panelled gates giving access from the service drive. The courtyard has 2-storey block running eastwards (the faux-chapel range) with triple-arched lean-to loggia to the ground floor; 2- and 3-light windows to the first floor above. Single-storey store range at right-angles to the N; pitched slate roof, cross-windows. The rear of the main block has the square water tower projecting slightly to the centre with 3 bays to the L having 2 shallow gables; the left-hand bay has a 2-storey canted bay window; mullioned and transmullioned windows to this and the adjacent bays on ground and first floors; 2-light windows to the second floor. The billiard room range overlaps the tower slightly on the R.