A house in a box

We went to Hill House this morning in Helensburgh.  Designed by Charles Rennie Mackintosh for Walter Blackie (the publisher) the house is very impressive.  We were all struck by how a few simple lines could bring about something of timeless beauty,  both in the large scale of the architecture and in the detail of things such as the moulding on the end of a bed frame.

When built, the house was covered in a cement render and rough cast.  CRM would not have known that this was an unfortunate choice for a damp windy place and so the external structure of the house has suffered seriously from water ingress.  To buy time, the National Trust for Scotland have built the box around the house. Effectively, a steel framework supporting a corrugated roof and with chain mail sides.  The box includes walkways which allow visitors to stroll around the house at the level of the gutters, and also over the ridge line.

My blip is a three shot vertical panorama, to which I have had to apply a lot of distortion correction,  hence the odd looking perspective. See the extra for an outside view.

The visitor reception, coffee shop and a terrace above the coffee shop are all contained within the box  so on a warm day one could sit and admire the roof while enjoying the obligatory cake :-)

Well worth a visit if you are in the area.

Thanks to everyone who has visited my journal recently - all much appreciated.