Beatrice Sharp of Hill of Tarvit

Beatrice White was born on 29 February 1864 at Castle Huntly, around 7 miles west of Dundee. She was the fifth child of eight – two boys and six girls. Around 1880, her father bought Balruddery House (demolished in 1964), 2 miles to the north. The family moved in the following year, after extensive renovations. Beatrice’s brother Martin had installed electricity using hydropower from a dam on the estate, and the house had a new oil-fired dynamo. This was one of the first houses in Scotland to have full electric lighting.

Beatrice White, aged about six Copyright: H S Cockrell and S G S Wenley

Balruddery House, Beatrice White’s family home, c1881

Copyright: H S Cockrell and S G S Wenley

Beatrice lived at Balruddery until she married Frederick Sharp, a wealthy jute manufacturer, in 1895. She was 32 and a well-travelled woman of independent means, presumably used to thinking for herself. Having lived surrounded by state-of-the-art technology, she would have been well placed to work with her husband in designing their new home.

They bought the estate of Wemyss Hall in 1904 and asked Robert Lorimer to remodel the 17th-century mansion. The result was a light-filled, modern home – the mansion house of Hill of Tarvit – which included the latest hot water plumbing, electricity and an internal telephone system.