Report - Stronvar House, nr. Lochearnhead November 2017

[mookster]

Stronvar House is a stately mansion nestled in the foothills of the ‘Braes of Balquhidder’ running onto the picturesque Loch Voil. The house was built for David Carnegie and his family in the 1850’s, but it’s origins run deeper and date back to Jacobean Scotland, when the ancestors of the Carnegie family were forced to flee Scotland to Scandinavia after the Battle of Culloden in 1746. Over 100 years later, with family wealth garnered from the brewing and refining of sugar in Sweden, David Carnegie returned to Scotland with his family and commissioned esteemed Victoria architect David Bryce to build what we become Stronvar House.

David Bryce remains a revered name in classical architecture to this very day and is widely regarded as one of Scotland’s most famous designer. His works include Fettes College, the Bank of Scotland Head Office on The Mound in Edinburgh, Balfour Castle in Orkney and Torosay Castle on the Isle of Mull. His works are renowned and Stronvar House was designed during the peak of his career. There has been residence on the current grounds since the 16th century and was owned by the famed Stewart clan. Prior to David Carnegie’s extensive development of the land, the property was named Glen Buckie and boasted stables alongside extensive farmland. Carnegie’s work commenced in 1849 and finished some 2 years later and the rest, as they say, is history. Stronvar remained in the Carnegie family beyond David’s death in 1890 up until 1952 when it was taken over by the Scottish Youth Hostel Association who maintained it as a local establishment in the beautiful tourist spot of Balquhidder.

One from a few years ago. I had seen a photo of the main staircase on Flickr not long before the trip to Scotland and, with no location info to hand other than 'Scotland' and a previous landscape photo on the user's profile of a large (named) hill taken a few hours prior, I set about trying to find it. After a good deal of actual, proper detective work I tracked it down and then realised that there had been a newspaper sellout put it in the local press earlier in 2017 - annoying! Anyway on the list it went and the trip was planned around staying nearby in Lochearnhead so we could attempt to explore it.

We arrived in Lochearnhead mid afternoon and decided that as we had a massively long day the next day doing both exploring and travelling home we would make the short drive out to the tiny hamlet of Balquhidder and see if we could make a go of the place that afternoon/early evening. Following a long walk down a path which interestingly took us past a half-finished but abandoned housing development, I saw the large looming spectre of the building appear in front of me. In contrast to the photos I'd seen in the shitrag newspaper article all the lower windows were now freshly boarded which didn't immediately fill me with confidence, however after a short while of poking around not knowing what to expect I managed to spot an easy way in.

After getting inside it became apparent that there was some effort to convert the building going on, which seemed to have temporarily stalled - either that or we got it on a lucky day! I spent most of my time in there trying to photograph the main entrance hall and staircase properly in the rapidly disappearing light, which left precious little time to roam around the rest of the property although it was mostly gutted. Sadly my at the time only working torch died, it was an agonising slow fading death which was extremely frustrating so with the sky darkening outside and no adequate light sources left we were forced to leave.

From what I gather the property is now being renovated again, looking at a drone video taken of it last year it has a new roof and new windows in most of the building at least.

Thanks for looking ​

 

[mission__urbex]

Always like a bit of stairs

 

[Bikin Glynn]

Agreed I like the second stairwell, cant beat a bit of steel ;-)

 

[HughieD]

That staircase. Fantastic.

 

[Calamity Jane]

Staircases always a favourite. The wood panelled stairs are fab, youve done a good job with several angles there. Lovely design. 4th photo really shows it off with the stone walls at the top. Stunning. Also the ironwork on the second stairwell is great, I do like a bit of twisted ornate iron work. Great work