Culzean Castle

Perched on a cliff above the Firth of Clyde near Maybole, Culzean Castle is less a fortress than a grand 18th-century mansion dressed in castellated style. The architect Robert Adam remodelled it between 1777 and 1792 for the 10th Earl of Cassillis, replacing an older tower house with an elegant country seat. Adam’s design turns on a great drum tower containing a circular saloon that looks out to sea, reached by way of a sweeping oval staircase — among the finest interiors he ever produced. For generations the house was the seat of the Marquess of Ailsa, chief of Clan Kennedy, until the family gave it to the National Trust for Scotland in 1945 to settle inheritance duties. A top-floor apartment was set aside for General Dwight D. Eisenhower in thanks for his wartime command; he first stayed in 1946 and returned several times. The surrounding grounds, now a country park of some 240 acres, run down to sea caves beneath the rock. Culzean is said to keep at least seven ghosts, a piper among them, and its silhouette graced Royal Bank of Scotland five-pound notes from 1972 to 2015.