James Playfair (architect)

James Playfair (5 August 1755 – 23 February 1794) was a Scottish architect who worked largely in the neoclassical tradition.

[1] He established himself in London in the mid 1780s with the support of politician Henry Dundas, who assisted him in developing a client base largely made up of other Scots.

James Playfair's works include Melville Castle, which he designed for Dundas in Midlothian and the Glens Old Parish Church, Kirriemuir (1786–1788).

His most famous building is Cairness House (1791–1797), in Aberdeenshire, which used revolutionary forms of neoclassicism, and is unique in British architecture of the period.

Cairness House shows the influence of the French architects Étienne-Louis Boullée and Claude Nicholas Ledoux, and is also notable for having the earliest complete Egyptian room in Britain.