Lying prominently at the end of Dunbar's High Street is Lauderdale House. The original house was built around 1740 for Captain James Fall, a local Member of Parliament. Unfortunately his son, a Provost and merchant in Dunbar was forced to sell it when he fell on hard times. James Maitland, the 8th Earl of Lauderdale, purchased the house and commissioned architect Robert Adam (1728-92) to remodel and extend it. However, Adam died before the work was finished and the house was completed by his younger brother, James (1732-94). The house consists of a central block (based on the original house of 1740), to which the Adams attached two flanking pavilions. In the centre of the front is a particularly handsome semi-circular porch, supported by four Ionic columns.
Used as a military headquarters from the middle of the 18th Century and then coming into the hands of the local council, the house was recently converted and divided into private flats.
