Restoring Fairburn Tower:
Fairburn Tower
Muir of Ord, Marybank · 2022
Fairburn Tower is a 16th-century A-listed tower house at Muir of Ord in Ross-shire, standing roofless and ruinous before the works began. The Landmark Trust appointed us as main contractor to restore it and convert it to holiday accommodation, to a design by Simpson & Brown Architects. The contract covered the full restoration: consolidating and repairing the masonry, replacing stone, harling the walls in lime, forming a new slated roof with leadwork, and fitting out the interior. The completed restoration won the Heritage Project category at the RICS Awards 2024 for Scotland, won an RIAS Award and the RIAS Regeneration and Conservation Award in 2025, received a RIBA National Award in 2025 and was a finalist for the RIAS Andrew Doolan Best Building in Scotland Award 2025.
Before & after
Drag across the image to compare the building before our work and after completion.
BeforeAfter
The challenge
The tower is built from a mix of masonry types, including rubble and sandstone of different periods, with large variations in hardness and porosity across the elevations. Wallheads had loose inner leaf masonry, gable chimneys were leaning, lintels were cracked or failing and there were voids and structural cracks in the walls, including in the stair tower. The site is exposed and remote, with high levels of scaffold needed to reach every elevation. The work also had to follow a conservation specification closely, with sample areas and trial cleaning agreed with the architect before each process began.
Our solution
The tower was fully scaffolded to a temporary works design, with additional buttressing and kentledge, before repair began. Loose and failing masonry was consolidated and rebuilt, lintels were replaced or supported, and new sandstone was cut in our workshop to a numbered cutting list for each elevation. Stonework was cleaned using the DOFF system after trial samples, and repointing and harling followed the architect's specification. Harling is a hot lime and sharp sand mortar mixed in advance, thrown by hand in a single coat, kept damp while it cures and finished in limewash. The roofs were re-formed in timber and sarked, and slated in reclaimed Scottish slate, with sample slates reviewed on site with the architect. Lead detailing at crow steps, bartizans and the dormer was developed with the design team during the works, using Code 6 and Code 7 lead with soakers and cover flashings. Internally, the walls were lined with an insulating plaster board system finished in lime plaster, so the tower is warm to live in without a vapour barrier or an air gap behind the finish, and new floors, a new stair, windows and doors were installed.
“We're particularly pleased that LTM employed apprentices onsite.”
The Landmark TrustClient
Outcomes
A ruin made weathertight
Masonry consolidated and repaired, with a new slated and leaded roof over the tower.
Traditional materials throughout
Replacement sandstone, lime harling and limewash, insulating plaster board, lime plaster and reclaimed slate used to the architect's specification.
Ready for a new use
The tower fitted out internally and now in use as self-catering holiday accommodation for The Landmark Trust.
Award-winning restoration
Winner of the Heritage Project category at the RICS Awards 2024 for Scotland, an RIAS Award and the RIAS Regeneration and Conservation Award 2025 and a RIBA National Award 2025, and a finalist for the RIAS Andrew Doolan Best Building in Scotland Award 2025, with LTM credited as contractor.
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