A house designed by Charles Rennie Mackintosh has been put on the market and looks likely to become the country’s most expensive home. Windyhill House in Kilmalcolm, Renfrewshire, 15 miles outside Glasgow, is the only remaining Mackintosh-designed, privately owned residential property and carries a suitably eye-catching price tag of £5m. Currently, the most expensive house in Scotland belongs to Rangers chairman David Murray, who paid £4.5m in October for his six bedroom Edinburgh home.

The characteristically L-shaped house is one of only two that Mackintosh designed and realised during his lifetime. The grade ‘A’ listed building, constructed using natural stone from the surrounding area, boasts three public rooms, seven bedrooms, two bathrooms and a reception area. Windyhill has never been shown in public at any time since it was built in 1900 and has been expertly restored to integrate its original features with the demands of modern living. The interior shows many of the design features, materials and colours that made the architect famous throughout the world. Of particular interest is the magnificent staircase and hallway, featuring coloured and leaded glass constructed by Mackintosh’s wife, Margaret. Windyhill also features leafy private gardens, which look out onto the countryside from the main south facing rooms and integrate a lily pond with shrubs and ornamental trees.

Mackintosh originally designed the house for his friend and loyal patron William Davidson, who purchased Windyhill for the rather more modest price of £2500 and lived there until 1937. According to the entertaining property schedule, Mackintosh had to be thrown into the lily pond by his friend when his beard accidentally caught fire as he was laying presents around the tree while dressed as Father Christmas.

The full schedule for the house can be viewed at www.masondrydenmurray.com