This once-opulent playground of the rich is now getting a rum deal

[THE NAMES OF a few great houses come up time and again when conservation specialists get talking. One such is Kinloch Castle on the Isle of Rum, 15 miles south-west of the Isle of Skye. The playhouse of unimaginably wealthy and eccentric industrialists the Bullough family – mass-manufacturers of spinning and weaving machinery during Britain’s imperial century – it was built between 1897-1900 and finished, furnished and equipped as befitted the most ambitious of society hosts of the forthcoming Edwardian era.

It was the first Scottish house built to have electric light, probably the only one to have its own fully-equipped dental surgery and its gardens were made fertile with 250,000 tonnes of soil imported from Ayrshire.

The island became George Bullough’s sporting retreat and the castle his party-piece. Seasonal guests included relatives, royalty, stalkers, and showgirls – all ferried to-and-fro by his steam-yacht Rhouma. During its short-lived hey-day its hothouses were so opulent they sustained a population of hummingbirds, with alligators lurking in pools beneath. The outbreak of World War One brought the end of the party, the modernisation of industry, the democratisation of technology and the dissipation of wealth.

After George’s death in 1937 the island was hardly visited and in 1957 his widow disposed of it to The Nature Conservancy with contents intact – initialled hairbrushes still on dressing-tables, monogrammed cutlery on the sideboard, taxidermy around every corner, paintings undisturbed on every wall – to be used as a National Nature Reserve.

The successor body, NatureScot, is an unwilling custodian. Its purpose is at odds with that of the builder, and with no need for a castle or skills to look after it Scottish nature is gradually reclaiming the building. Vegetation sprouts from gutters and chimneys, moths flutter among the skins and silks and fungus creeps through the timbers. Some contents have been removed ‘for safekeeping’ and room-by-room the panelling is ripped out to track the progress of dry rot.

When the voluntary group Kinloch Castle Friends Association asked specialist surveyors Smith & Garratt to inspect the building and report on the causes of its woes, director Hugh Garratt jumped at the chance.

“I was intrigued because it’s widely thought of as a basket case,” he said, “but underneath it’s beautifully built and an astonishing achievement. I’ll give just one example – the castle is constructed of brick and faced in George Bullough’s favourite stone, which was shipped in from Arran; in between is a layer of hot-applied bitumen mortar, which prevents the worst of the west coast weather penetrating the walls. Legend has it that it took 300 craftsmen three years to build, and they knew what they were doing – it’s a showcase of late Victorian innovation. Kinloch’s problems arise through a lack of understanding; it only remains upright due to the foresight and attention to detail of the original architects, Leeming & Leeming.”

The Friends commissioned a rescue scheme to restore the whole, funded by providing B&B accommodation for up to 50 in the staff wings with 13 grand suites at the front. Studies were made, planning and listed building consents were obtained, a competent budget and business plan were written. Their application for transfer as a community asset failed for lack of government support…and now NatureScot offers it for sale. “It’s great shame the bid failed,” lamented Hugh. “It put the Friends in the same boat as Prince Charles, who attempted to save Kinloch 10 years ago, when it would have been easier. The castle needs a new owner who will love it, has the sense to understand it before leaping to

conclusions, as well as deep pockets and even deeper reserves of fortitude.”

Apart from the damp-proofing layer of hot-applied bitumen mortar, innovative details at Kinloch include steel beams – not cast iron – rivetted together in the manner of shipbuilding and set with vents in their bearing plates. The kitchens are fire-separated using concrete ceilings; purlin-ends set into walls containing flues are fire-proofed with iron shoes; and rooms are ventilated by a venturi system at each of the corner turrets, drawing air through an amazing array of ducts inside the walls and through the roof voids. That allowed the building to be constantly heated by coal fires, and heat loss was minimised by minimising air flow through the roof voids.

Despite being the first house in Scotland to be built with electric lighting – the power supplied by its own hydro scheme – it also has an acetylene gas plant. All the materials arrived by barge and beside the old jetty stands a lime kiln, erected to ensure a reliable supply of mortar for the masons and lime for plaster.

So why is this Leviathan in such trouble? Lack of maintenance, for sure; but the single biggest disaster was a drain left blocked for 25 years. That simple and avoidable issue allowed the basement to flood routinely to a metre deep, extinguishing the oil-fired boilers. Engineers would come from the mainland, pump out the water, repair the boilers and send a blast of heat through the building to dry it out. The heat carried moisture to the roof voids, where it condensed on the underside of the cold roof and dripped down through the fabric like a rain forest – stimulating multiple outbreaks of dry rot.

Despite widespread decay, one cannot help but wonder at the innovations and achievements of the castle’s construction. Even ignoring its aesthetic, its majesty and the extraordinary timecapsule quality of its fixtures, fittings and contents, the character of its construction is sufficiently interesting to merit its Category-A listing…and it also merits restoration. q

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