Listed Building: Clachnaharry High Street, Former Clachnaharry Public School (LB51862)

Description: William Mackintosh for Inverness Burgh School Board; dated 1876 (to wallhead stack). Small, gabled, single storey, former Burgh school in Early Gothic Revival style with large pointed-arch windows. Coursed squared rubble with moulded dressings and margins. SOUTH (PRINCIPAL) ELEVATION: roughly 5 bays with advanced broad gabled wings to outer bays. Roll-moulded doorpiece with projecting hoodmould to advanced piend-roof porch in re-entrant angle to W. Corbelled-out and shouldered wallhead stack with moulded date panel to re-entrant angle to left. Large tri-partite pointed-arch windows with hoodmoulds and louvred quatrefoil openings above to outer bays. WEST ELEVATION: gable to NW with single-storey lean-to; roll-moulded surround to timber door. Pair of pointed-arch windows above. Later single-storey addition to rear. Timber sash and case windows. Pitched roof, grey slates. End stack with octagonal ashlar flue; corbelled, shouldered wallhead stack with capped round flues; some clay cans. Cast-iron rainwater goods. References: 2nd Edition Ordnance Survey Map (1899). John Gifford, The Buildings of Scotland - Highlands and Islands (1992) p193. Am Baile Newspaper Indexes, Inverness Advertiser - 27 October 1876, www.ambaile.org.uk (accessed 20.08.2011) www.scottisharchitects.org.uk (accessed 20.08.2011) Notes: The former Clachnaharry School is an early and well-detailed example of a post 1872 Education Act school in the Inverness area. The large pointed-arch windows are a distinctive feature and the roll-moulded dressings and the corbelled-out chimney stack to the principal elevation worthy of note. Set back from the High Street between residential cottages and villas, the building contributes to the architectural and historic interest of Clachnaharry. The 1872 Education Act initiated a programme of school building throughout the Highlands and the rest of Scotland over successive decades resulting in hundreds of new schools in small villages and serving rural areas. Clachnaharry was the first school by the newly formed Board in the Inverness area following the passing of the Act. The official opening reported in the Inverness Advertiser noted that the "handsome building" by prolific Inverness architect William Mackintosh was "quite an ornament to the little village" and explained that the building would accommodate 150 pupils with the chief classroom for 70 pupils forming the central part of the building with the "wings at each end forming the second and third apartments" for 50 and 30 pupils respectively. The total cost of the school was 1290 pounds. Mackintosh practised between 1870 and 1913, specialising mainly in private residential commissions.