Bute House
Bute House ( Scots Bute Hoose , Scottish Gaelic Taigh Bhòid ) is a city palace in the Scottish capital Edinburgh . The Grade A listed building has been the official residence of the First Minister of Scotland since 1999 .
location
The building is the middle house of a row of houses on the north side of Charlotte Square , a rectangular square in the New Town of Edinburgh, which was planned in the 18th century . Bute House, Charlotte Square No 6 , is adjacent to Georgian House No 7 , which is used as a museum by the National Trust for Scotland .
history
In 1791 the Lord Provost and the City of Edinburgh Council commissioned Robert Adam , the leading Scottish architect at the time, to design Charlotte Square as one of the central squares of the New Town. Adams died in 1792, so that he could no longer build it himself.
The property's land was purchased from shoemaker Orlando Heart in 1790 for £ 290 . The buildings on the north side of the square were the first to be built around the square. In 1806 the politician John Sinclair bought the house for £ 2950. He sold it in 1816, and the house continued to change hands several times in the 19th century before the 4th Marquess of Bute began buying up the houses on the north side of Charlotte Square in 1903 . He first acquired house number 5 and later also numbers 6, 7 and 8. The architecture enthusiast Bute had the row of houses restored by the architect Balfour Paul in the style of the late 18th century from 1923 onwards . From 1930, No 6 served as the town house of the Marquess of Bute, which is why it got its current name. In 1966 the 6th Marquess of Bute gave the house together with the adjoining houses No 5 and 7 to the National Trust for Scotland for the payment of inheritance taxes. The Bute House was used as the official residence of the Secretary of State for Scotland but remained the property of the National Trust for Scotland. Following the creation of the First Minister's Office , Bute House has served as his official residence since 1999.
Exterior
The row of houses on the north side of Charlotte Square are among the finest examples of Georgian style in Edinburgh. The four individual houses have a uniform, palatial facade. The Bute House, located in the middle, stands out from the adjoining, simpler houses with a central projectile with four pilasters and a triangular pediment, as well as two side projections with two pilasters each and a roof parapet. The three-storey building has a rusticated ground floor above the basement, with an outside staircase leading to the entrance door. The piano nobile above is emphasized by a Venetian window . There is a low mezzanine floor above the piano nobile .
Interior
Inside, the entrance hall, the drawing room and the dining room are set up as representative rooms in Georgian style. The rooms still have stucco ceilings from the time it was built, and the furniture from the late 18th century was provided by the National Trust. In the Drawing Room is a life-size portrait of the 3rd Earl of Bute , painted by Allan Ramsay , who was the first Scotsman to be British Prime Minister in the 18th century .
Individual evidence
- ↑ https://firstminister.gov.scot/about/bute-house/ Bute House
- ^ [1] The Charlotte Square Collection
- ↑ [2] Chris McCall in The Scotsman , “Robert Adam: The architect who brought Rome to Scotland”, December 21, 2016
Web links
Coordinates: 55 ° 57 ′ 9.1 ″ N , 3 ° 12 ′ 28.9 ″ W.