All set for the next 500 years

The present tower house, which dates back to about 1480, is thought to

have been built by the first Lord Seton, one of whose ancestors helped

to mastermind Mary Queen of Scots' escape from her island imprisonment

in Loch Leven in 1568 and brought her to Niddry Castle.

In time it passed to the Hope Family who later built stately Hopetoun

House, after which time the castle was allowed to fall into disrepair.

Peter Wright and his family moved in at the end of 1989. The present

owners acquired it in 1984, and worked on its sympathetic restoration

with aid granted because of its Ancient Monument and Category B

status.Further grants may be available for the finishing work which

still has to be done.

The Wright family took up residence in the castle at the end of 1989.

The accomodation. contained on five floors, has been restored with

great care in order to preserve much of the original character, with

fine stonework, plasterwork and exposed floor and ceiling beams.

It now contains the original great hall, guard room and dungeon,

gallery/store and former kitchen.

There are also two reception rooms, a master bedroom suite, four

further bedrooms, a kitchen breakfast room, a utility room and

cloakrooms and full gas-fired central heating.

Niddry Castle, which is on sale through W. & J. Burness at offers over

#195,000, is the jewel in the crown of residential properties on sale in

West Lothian.

A new face for West Lothian.

FOR many years after the war, West Lothian was seen as an industrial

wasteland, despite the fact that it provides an ideal location in which

to live for people working in Edinburgh or Glasgow.

As much of the area's industrial heritage of disused shale oil bings,

coal mines and steelworks has been removed or landscaped, the county has

gradually taken on a new and attractive character, with many of the

former homes of farm and industrial workers, and their masters, being

converted into modern dwellings.

There are rather fewer country houses here than in many other areas in

the Central Belt, but those which were created were often built by the

''commuters'' from another era, such as prosperous lawyers and

businessmen, and these, together with the handful of remaining castles,

now form the main part of West Lothian's more-imposing properties.

Another property in an attractive rural setting is Gowanbank House,

which lies to the west of Bathgate and carries a price-tag of around

#125,000. The property was extended in the middle of the last century by

the eminent Scottish architect Sir James Gowans, and the house contains

a range of reception rooms plus a library on the ground floor and four

double bedrooms above.

Conversions currently on the market in West Lothian include the

steading of Springfield Farm, to the east of Linlithgow, which has been

divided into six upmarket units priced close to #200,000 each.

Lower down the scale the attractive, and again, sympathetically

re-styled, three-bedroom Craigend Cottage, five miles west of Falkirk,

was recently offered at #135,000. However, those in search of a

'renovator's dream' will have to be patient as such properties -- which

do still exist -- only come onto the market in small numbers each year,

particularly those which have potential while at the same time being

attractively priced.

West Lothian has perhaps for too long been a county through which

people sped on their way to and from work. If you take time to motor

slowly through the area around the Bathgate Hills, you will find homes

surrounded by open countryside, some of which also enjoy views of the

waters of the Firth of Forth.

There are areas here which are just as attractive as the much-vaunted

countryside of East Lothian, and properties in West Lothian still

possess the added attraction of being much more realistically priced

than their eastern neighbours.