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Stoneywood Icehouse

Stoneywood, Dyce, Aberdeen, Aberdeenshire.

Subterranean icehouse / cellar, 19th or 18th Century.

A low 3.5m-long tunnel (2m tall x 1m wide) with granite ashlar walls leads into a vaulted chamber that is square (3.35m sq) in plan view. This chamber has granite-rubble walls which are partly covered in lime mortar, and a brick arched roof at the top of which is a stone-sealed access vent (~0.5m sq). The chamber floor is largely covered in soil and a large number of wooden sticks, although a number of in-situ stone slabs along the chamber margins suggest that the original floor level is similar to present. A 0.4m-squared soil-clogged hole bound by polished stone slabs seen in the SE corner, and a metre-wide T-shaped gap in the NW corner probably represent drains/sumps for meltwater. Four loose worked granite blocks (ranging from 0.5-0.6m long) are present on the floor.

The mortar outlines of what would have been at least two well-sealed doorways are present along the access tunnel; one where the access tunnel meets the chamber, and the other 1.2m further back. Initial access involves walking down soil/vegetation infill which has reduced the initial passage height to c.1m, hence it is difficult to determine whether or not steps are present below the soil and grass cutting spoil.

The site is located near the top of a wooded embankment along the western side of the River Don, just upstream of the upper weir. Its location just below the edge of the garden grounds near the northernmost corner of Stoneywood House, which the icehouse presumably served, would have made it a useful cellar. The features and their position suggest that the chamber was used for ice storage, further aided by a position in the shelter of trees in close proximity to the Don (and nearby Mill Dam) that would have frozen over at times. Whilst the square in plan shape would be unusual for an icehouse, such examples are known from elsewhere in NE Scotland (e.g. House of Dun & Leith Hall). However, it is possible that the chamber was a cellar that used ice to cool food, as opposed to store ice specifically.

At the time of writing [2024], the internal walls have been covered by multiple pieces of modern graffiti, with plastic litter also highlighting some modern usage as a recreational shelter.

Alternative Names: Stoneywood House Icehouse

Notes: A structure with a former path to it may be noted at this locality on the 1901 OS 25" map (drawn as a discrete hashed ovoid), although there is no surface expression of the chamber in the overlying garden at present day.

The location straddles the eastern unfenced boundary of the Stoneywood House garden grounds, just upslope of a public riverside pathway (that is fenced off just south of the site). It is therefore difficult to determine whether access should be restricted in what may be private grounds.

Whilst a (chalybeate) spring is consistently shown in this area on OS maps, it is marked at a location further to the NNW on the 1901 25" OS map.

Stoneywood House, constructed in 1850, is a Grade B listed property.

The original Mansion House of Stoneywood was built by the Moir Family in 1700 [on the current paper mill grounds] who made the Estate their Home until 1789. It then became the Home of the Forbes Family who lived at Stoneywood until 1877 when the Estate was Purchased by the Pirie Family of Aberdeen (Papermaking Magnates). [Doric Columns]