Located opposite Rothesay Castle, in the town centre, Bute County Buildings are a little toy fort of a construction, looking as if they were built from children's lego bricks. Built in 1832, to provide a courthouse, jail and administrative offices for the County of Bute, the building was the work of Greenock-based James Dempster (1798 - 1867). It comprises a two-storey symmetrical design with a three-storey machicolated clock tower in the centre. Enlarged in 1865 and altered internally in 1888, it is now B-listed. Following local government re-organisation the building became a regional office for Argyll & Bute Council. Having fallen from use, the building was subject to an award-winning conversion into housing by Glasgow-based Collective Architecture in 2011, at a cost of £4.1 million.