Dunninald

http://data.historic-scotland.gov.uk/pls/htmldb/f?p=2400:10:763484569647849

Type of Site

A small 18th-century park and an informal 20th-century garden set within an earlier structure, together with a walled flower and vegetable garden.

Location and Setting

The estate of Dunninald is situated on a hilltop on the Angus coast south of the Montrose Basin and north of Lunan Bay. It lies to the east of the A92. The designed landscape occupies a small irregularly shaped site bounded by minor roads. There is a view from the front of the house over the ha-ha to the parkland and woodland. Otherwise the site is self-contained.

The earliest reliable map of Dunninald is a survey of 1811 by George Robertson which indicates a landscape layout similar to that of the present site. The boundaries remain the same today.

Landscape Components

Architectural Features

Dunninald Castle is an early 19th-century two-storey Gothic castellated mansion designed by James Gillespie Graham. A pair of early 18th-century Renaissance Gate Piers, supporting vase finials, stand at the end of the beech avenue and on a north-south axis with the mount. The North Lodge and Gates comprise a Tudor-Gothic arch flanked by octagonal towers, battlemented parapet and screen wall incorporating a single-storey lodge. The South Lodge is a single-storey stone-built building with a slate roof and Gothic pointed windows. The South Entrance Gateway consists of four plain stone gate piers with pyramid cap stones. The design of the two hand gates reflects the Gothic tracery of the lodge windows. The semicircular stone wall, which probably once supported iron railings, are now surmounted by a beech hedge. The Stable Courtyard and Mains Steading are late 18th-century two-storey classical range buildings, designed by Sir John Soane. Built into the wall of the steading is a Dovecot with classical pediment, into which the flight holes are set. The Walled Garden is a mixture of brick and stone, the south wall being part of the old 17th-century house. The north wall is lined with brick on the inside and has rounded corners. Two fine wrought-iron gates, one decorated with symbols of each country of the British Isles, lead into the garden on the north and west sides and were constructed by Montrose blacksmith James Ross Brown in 1906 and 1907. A small shelter with a tile roof supported on Ionic stone columns is situated in the lower half of the walled garden. This shelter contains a stone excavated by Mr Quibell in 1913 in the Coptic convent of St Jeremias, Sakhara, Egypt, and installed here in 1915. A Commemorative Plaque is set into the wall by the west gate. The wall is raised behind and ornamented with ball finials. On the back of the wall, a Well with lion mask is protected within an open tiled roof shelter. A Ha-Ha with ditch and stone retaining wall separates the park and garden.

Drives and Approaches

Historically, the grey gravel drive which approaches the house from the northwest is the earliest existing entry. This drive makes a short curve to the north of the house and sweeps around to the west front. The Victorian north drive is shown on the 1904 OS map. The south drive was made when the present house was built around 1820, but has been closed and is today retained as a walk through the garden.

Parkland

The small area of parkland lies to the north and west of the house and garden and is surrounded on all sides by perimeter woodland. The layout remains similar to that of the 18th century except for some broadening of the perimeter belts on the east and west.

The specimen tree plantings and roundels have thinned since the original layout. The roundels contain beech, larch, ash and conifers.

Woodland

The woodland comprises the perimeter planting to the park and dates back to the 18th-century enclosure of the land. Apart from providing shelter to the policies, it provides the background to the park when viewed from inside the policies and from the house. There is a circuit through the perimeter planting. The general character of the woodland is deciduous with some coniferous plantations. The predominant species are beech, sycamore, Sitka spruce, ash, lime, rowan, larch and Scots pine.

Because of the exposed position of the site, the trees have been much subjected to storms so little of the 18th-century planting survives. Most of the woodland is 100 years old or less and is being constantly renewed.

Water Features

An informal pond, created in the mid 19th century, is situated in the western woodland strip. It was closed in on the east post-1950 by the planting of a conifer plantation. The pond has been dredged, but the water levels are erratic.

The Gardens

The present garden lies mainly to the south of the present castle. The view from the front of the house faces west over a gravel sweep and a croquet lawn and continues uninterrupted over a ha-ha and into parkland. A terrace built in 1901 to the south of the house overlooks an area of lawn and wild flower garden. This is bounded to the south by trees and the now disused south drive which is maintained as a grass walk.

To the east of the house the garden is divided roughly in half by the beech avenue or Green Walk which runs north-south. It is likely that the avenue would originally have extended to the north with the mound as a focal point. However, the later east drive cuts through the north end of the avenue. The present north end of the avenue is marked by two Renaissance pillars. Similar pillars mark the mid-point of an avenue at nearby Brechin Castle. An informally planted area of trees, shrubs and meadow grass lies to the east of the beech avenue and to the north of the walled garden. Informally mown paths lead to an old aviary and to the walled garden. The southern end of the beech avenue is marked by two enormous yew trees on mounds, close to the site of the old house. At this point the beech avenue merges with the now disused south drive. A strip of mixed deciduous woodland, some of which dates from the early 18th century, lies between the old drive and the ha-ha. This strip is in fact a low wide bank, probably formed from the spoil of the ha-ha. The age of some of the trees planted on the bank indicates that the ha-ha is early 18th century. The trees include sweet chestnut (Castanea sativa), Wych elm and sycamore, underplanted with 19th-century plantings of Rhododendron ponticum.

The area to the west of the old drive also supports some very old trees, notably a larch. This area borders and forms part of the wild garden and contains a mixture of trees and shrubs underplanted with spring bulbs. The piece of ground to the east of the beech avenue is laid out with shrubs and specimen trees and is being developed as an arboretum. Mown paths lead through this area, particularly from the aviary in the north to the walled garden.

Walled Garden

The walled garden lies to the south of the present house and incorporates a screen wall from the manor house in its southern boundary. The garden is on a gentle south-facing slope and is divided into two distinct upper and lower sections by a wall. The upper section covers approximately two-thirds of the walled garden and the lower section covers the remaining third. The glass-house range is set against the south side of the dividing wall. The lower walls, of dry-stone rubble, are remains of an earlier house. The upper walls are stone on the outside with a brick inner facing. The walls are curved at the north end.

The garden is treated in a traditional manner of mixed vegetable fruit and flowers. The upper section of the garden is divided into box-edged plots for growing vegetables with a central double herbaceous border. The lower part, below the glass-house range, is being developed and consists of lawn with shrubs. Espaliered fruit trees line the walls, A small garden house with an Edwardian garden bench provides a vista on the east-west axis.

A specimen Hoheria lyalli, the mountain ribonwood tree from New Zealand which was first collected by Joseph Hooker, forms a feature in the northwest corner.