Tag Archives: Cupar

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Hill of Tarvit

Hill of Tarvit

Hill of Tarvit

Date

 30 August 2013
Location

 Cupar, Fife

 NO 37874 11829; 56.29478°N, 3.00536°W

Information

Located 1.5 miles south of Cupar in Fife, Hill of Tarvit is an early 20th century mansion house set in grounds covering 113 hectares. In 1696 John Wemyss of Unthank built a stately home, Wemyss Hall, on the estate. Frederick Bower Sharp, from a wealthy jute-mill-owning family from Dundee, bought the estate in 1904 and proceeded between 1905 and 1908 to rebuild Wemyss Hall with Sir Robert Lorimer as architect. Sharp also added a 9-hole golf course to the grounds in 1924. Sharp’s daughter Elisabeth left the estate to the National Trust for Scotland when she died in 1948. Part of the house was used as a Marie Curie Foundation nursing home until 1977. The Trust closed the house to the public in 2009 to save costs only to later reopen it following criticisms when it was revealed that it would cost as much to maintain the closed property as would be lost when keeping it open.

Hill of Tarvit Mansion house and Garden (National Trust for Scotland);
Hill of Tarvit, Mansionhouse (Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Scotland)

 

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Cults Brick Ltd

Cults Brick Ltd

Cults Brick Ltd

Date

 29 August 2013
Location

 Cults, Cupar, Fife

 NO 35301 09045; 56.26944°N, 3.04624°W

Information

For around 150 years there was industrial activity at Cults, near Cupar in Fife, centred around the limestone mine there. A limeworks was in operation there until 2002 and the sand-cement brickworks closed in 2004. The latter was operated by Cults Brick Limited, which was incorporated in 1962 and finally wound up in 2007.

Closure of brickworks marks end of an era (Fife Today, 18 November 2004)

 

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Crawford Priory

Crawford Priory

Crawford Priory

Date

 29 August 2013
Location

 Bogle Wood, Cupar, Fife

 NO 34699 11236; 56.28903°N, 3.05651°W

Information

Crawford Priory, near Cupar in Fife, is the former family seat of the Earls of Crawford, the Earls of Glasgow and the Barons Cochrane of Cults. The original house, Crawford Lodge, dates back to 1758, and this was added to around 1810 by Lady Mary Lindsay Crawford, sister of the 22nd Earl of Crawford. The major extension, in the style of a Gothic priory, was designed by architects David Hamilton and James Gillespie Graham.

The house was closed and its fixtures and fittings, such as stained-glass windows and marble fireplaces, sold after the 2nd Baron Cochrane of Cults died in 1968. It was thereafter left to fall into a state of disrepair and was further damaged by a fire in 1995. Only the shell of the building remains today. The house received a Category B listing in 1984 and is said to be one of Scotland’s best examples of an early 19th century Gothic country house.

Nevertheless, in the face of stiff opposition from conservationists, Lord Cochrane of Cults, the 4th Baron and a Tory peer, controversially applied to Fife Council for permission to demolish the listed building in 1996.

Crawford Priory, Cults (British Listed Buildings);
Row over peer’s plan to demolish historic priory (The Herald, 5 February 1996)

 

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