Turret History

Turret History 

Turret lies between Glenfield and Leiper, and is entered by the House's original back door through an attractive round stone arch. The back door gives on to a small entrance hall lit from above by daylight. This hall originally lay on the passage route from the main kitchen to the food stores and utility rooms. The floor is currently at the same height as the surrounding areas formerly one stepped down into the back hall from both directions. The hall (now the dining area) is tiled in a variety of black designs against a white/grey background. While some of the tiles have been replaced the designs are original and date from the 1880s. The vine leaf tendril and Greek key patterns are amongst those employed. The tiles are set between wood uprights which rise to carved heads of an arts and crafts design based on foliage. Attractive sandstone masonry forms the entranceways to this hall. 

The modern kitchen on the right of the entrance hall is in part formed out of the former passageway which continued through to the generator and coal rooms (now in the adjacent Glenfield). In addition the kitchen incorporates the former meat and fish larders. Off the kitchen (although reduced in size) is one of the two surviving refrigeration rooms. The bathroom has been constructed from the former refrigeration chambers. Moving up the main passageway of Turret (once the main corridor of the servants' region) one has a firm impression of the spaciousness of the domestic quarters of Kinlochmoidart House, an effect which is enhanced by the skylights. At the head of the corridor can be seen the former generator isolation switch which disconnected the main house from the electric supply when more energy needed to be drawn for utility purposes. The bedrooms of Turret were formerly servants' bedrooms. The sitting room was formerly the Servants' Hall and unlike the servants' quarters of many another country house, has a most attractive outlook. The fireplace is original; a wide restored dado rail accentuates the proportions of the room and is very pleasing to the eye. The restoration of this area of the House has done full justice to the atmosphere of order and decorum which characterised domestic life in the country house before the First World War (4th August 1914 - 11th November 1918). Constructed in 1882-84 full scale domestic service continued at Kinlochmoidart for a span of thirty years until the second world war. The Turret conjures up the harmony of that pre-war era. 

Book to stay in Turret here.