Building record MAB3914 - MILTON BRODIE HOUSE, ALVES

Milton Brodie House and its designed landscape, built on site of earlier house and manor (MAB49975) on part of the lands of Kinloss Abbey.

Milton Brodie House and its designed landscape, built on site of earlier house and manor (MAB49975) on part of the lands of Kinloss Abbey. There are skew putts bearing a worn date of 1691. In 1798 the house was described as 'not modern', but by 1842 it had 'lately received considerable additions and improvements'. The south front dates to 1835 and 1840 and is built in the style of William Robertson of Elgin.

The infilling and frontage date to the early- to mid-18th Century. The 2-storey section and the attic U-plan courtyard house are of two or more phases. The frontage is rendered and lined as ashlar, with harled or harl pointed flanks, and rear and tooled and polished ashlar dressings and margins. The mainly single-storey, 7-bay south front screens an earlier rear, with a centre door with narrow side lights, and a tetrastyle Ionic porch with monolith columns. There are long paired flanking windows, lighting the drawing room to the left and the dining room to the right. The outer bays, which were formerly the gable ends of the flanking wings of the earlier house, have slightly advanced 2-storey pedimented window sections rising above the wall head with anthemion acroteria, and are supported by ornate scroll brackets. There are shallow aprons to the corniced ground floor windows in moulded lugged surrounds, and paired stacks with crown pediments. The end bays are linked by a continuous cornice and blocking course. The west elevation comprises a 2-by-2-storey and attic, and 3-bay blocks dating to the late-18th Century at the southwest, with the northwest and centre door blocks dating to 1900. Both blocks are linked by the set-back west gable of the original 2-storey and attic house, forming the small U-plan court. There is an irregular rear with a projecting gabled stairwell. Lying-pane glazing is used in the south front, and there are partially blind windows in the outer bays. There are paired, square, ashlar end and ridge stacks in the front, and various coped end stacks elsewhere.

On the interior, there is a wide entrance hall with a drawing room to the left and a dining room to the right, all dating from 1835-1840. The drawing room has tall double doors with a corniced overdoor, a carved wooden chimneypiece with marble slips, and a decorative plaster ceiling cornice with an anthemion design. The dining room has similar paired doors as the drawing room, an Ionic columned screen, a simple ceiling cornice, and a white painted chimneypiece with marble slips. 18th Century fielded panelled doors and window shutters survive in the older part of house, which has low ceilinged rooms.

There are two pairs of mid-18th Century gate piers flanking the east and south entrances. They are square, of polished ashlar, with shaped caps and ball finials on attenuated bases. The walled garden and gazebo no longer belong to the house. There was a lectern dovecot to the southwest (MAB49976) dated to 1769, which formerly belonged to the house but was demolished during the 1960s. An icehouse is shown at circa NJ 0929 6321 on the 1st and 2nd edition OS maps; it is not known if anything of this structure survives. A small cottage is sited to the north of the mansion (MAB3949), formerly known as 'The Penitentiary', which incorporates late-17th or 18th Century fabric.

SHAW, L, 1798, HIST OF PROV OF MORAY, 86-7 (Bibliographic reference). SAB1625.

WATSON, J, 1868, MORAYSHIRE DESCRIBED, 108 (Bibliographic reference). SAB2003.

WALKER, DW, 2015, THE BUILDINGS OF SCOTLAND: ABERDEENSHIRE: NORTH AND MORAY, p.705-6 (Bibliographic reference). SAB3422.

SDD, n.d., BLDS OF ARCH & HIST INTEREST, ALVES No4 (Bibliographic reference). SAB1827.

Author unknown, n.d., FORRES GAZETTE, 05/08/1842 (Bibliographic reference). SAB523.

Author unknown, n.d., NSA, 104 (Bibliographic reference). SAB1269.

Record last edited

Oct 1 2026 4:49PM