Description

David MacGibbon and Thomas Ross, 1875, with alterations and additions by James Jerdan, 1889-90 (see Notes). 4-storey 4-bay symmetrical tenement block with Scots Baronial details. 2 crowstepped gables with truncated apex stacks; former shops at ground floor (now lodging house cafe). Squared and snecked stugged sandstone with polished dressings. Moulded cill course at 1st and 3rd floors. Original shop fronts with tripartite shoulder-arched windows flanking timber panelled door with plate glass fanlight in shoulder-arched opening. Corniced and consoled windows in moulded surrounds at 1st floor; bracketed projecting cills and moulded segmental relieving arches to 2nd floor windows; paired windows in gabled dormerheads; small round-arched gabletted windows at apex. Tall pitched-roofed brick stair tower with stone crowsteps and corniced stacks to rear (see Notes).

4-pane glazing in timber sash and case windows. Grey slates. Corniced wallhead and ridge stacks with circular cans.

Statement of Interest

Built as lodging houses for the poor, with shops to ground floor. The MacGibbon and Ross plan shows a series of little flats with narrow corridors with doors to external cast-iron balconies linked to stair towers, with external WC's at each level. Each shop had a single storey top-lit saloon to rear. James Jerdan's alterations of 1889 show the space opened up and turned into long dormitories, by the use of cast-iron beams, and the building of one tall brick stair tower with a cistern room and 'director's room' at the top. These alterations reflect the huge influx of immigrant labour (mainly from Ireland) in the later 19th century, many of whom ended up in the Grassmarket. Restored 1998.

External Links

• Historic Environment Scotland Listing

External links are from the relevant listing authority and, where applicable, Wikidata. Wikidata IDs may be related buildings as well as this specific building. If you want to add or update a link, you will need to do so by editing the Wikidata entry.

Recommended Books

• 
  Gloucestershire 1: The Cotswolds: Cotswolds Pt. 1 (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  [(Bedfordshire, Huntingdon and Peterborough)] [By (author) Nikolaus Pevsner] published on (January, 1968)
• 
  Herefordshire (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Norfolk 1: Norwich and North-East: Norwich and North-east v. 1 (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Lancashire: Manchester and the South-East (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Worcestershire Revised Edition (Buildings of England) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)