Description

George Washington Browne, dated 1887. 3 4-storey and attic curved tenement blocks (mansion flats) with 17th century/Queen Anne details including 2 corner tenements, shops at ground floor to NE. Cream sandstone, ashlar. Base course; rounded reveals to ground floor windows; architraved windows at 1st (pedimented), 2nd (corniced) and 3rd floor; cill course at 1st and 3rd floor; eaves cornice and parapet; swept ashlar flanks to dormers with cornices and pediments; ashlar mullions; corniced doorways with roll-moulded surrounds and rectangular plate glass fanlights; panels of carved classical reliefs to shopfront; bull's-eye windows with cartouche surrounds.

NW (BRUNTSFIELD PLACE) ELEVATION: Nos 131-141: 5-bay (excluding corner tower) with shops at ground floor with plain fascia, cornice and blocking course, some fronts altered, original doors with glazed oval panels Nos 131, 133. Above, centre bay and bay to right of centre with paired windows and bipartite dormers with triangular pediments. Single windows to bay to left of centre, semi-circular dormerhead. Bay to outer left blank with shouldered wallhead stack. 4-storey canted window breaking eaves as dormer with finialled pyramidal roof to outer right. Nos 143-147: 5-bay tenement with centre bay of bipartite windows and bipartite dormer with segmental-arched pediment. Bay to left of centre with full-height canted window with parapet and bipartite dormer with triangular pediment. Bay to right of centre with 3 entrance doors linked under cornice, bipartite windows above, bipartite dormer with segmental-arched pediment. Paired windows and bipartite dormer with segmental-arched pediment to outer left. Full-height canted window with parapet and bipartite dormer with triangular pediment to outer right. Nos 149-151: 6-bay (excluding canted corner bay) with 2 advanced centre bays under swept gable with segmental-arched pediment and bull's-eye window in gablehead over full-height canted window to left and single windows to right with paired entrance door linked under cornice. Paired windows with bipartite dormers and segmental-arched pediments in bays to left and right of centre. Single windows to bay to outer left with segmental-arched pedimented dormer. Blank bay to outer right with single window at ground floor.

NE (FORBES ROAD) ELEVATION: 3-bay including 5-sided corner tower; shops at ground floor; corner turret breaking eaves with finialled pyramidal roof to outer right, 3 sides with single windows alternating with 2 sides of narrow blinded pedimented windows at 1st and 2nd floor and carved tablets (date stone and initials JS) at 3rd floor. Paired windows to centre bay with bipartite dormer and open swan-neck pediment. Bipartite windows to outer left bay with open pediment to 1st floor windows and bipartite dormer with open swan-neck pediment.

SW (BRUNTSFIELD GARDENS) ELEVATION: 6-bay, including canted corner bay to outer left corbelled above ground floor and breaking eaves with ogee roof and cast-iron weathervane, pedimented carved tablet commemorating site of Greenfield House at ground floor. Bay at centre with single windows and segmental-arched pedimented dormer. Pedimented doorway in bay to left of centre with small single windows above and segmental-arch pedimented dormer. 2 advanced bays to right under pilastered and pedimented gable with swept ashlar flanks and bull's-eye window in gablehead over bipartite and single windows. Blank bay to outer left with bipartite window at ground floor and corniced wallhead stack. Timber sash and case windows with plate glass glazing, smaller upper sashes. Green slate mansard roof; corniced mutual stacks with friezes. Moulded eaves gutters.

INTERIOR: tiled Glasgow-style closes; open stairs with cast-iron balustrades.

Low rubble boundary wall to Nos 143-151 and 2 Bruntsfield Gardens, some plain cast-iron railings.

Statement of Interest

The period between 1860 and 1900 saw significant residential expansion in the city of Edinburgh with construction of a number of residential tenement suburbs.

The tenement block first appears on Johnstons' Plan of Edinburgh, Leith, Portobello and environs, 1888.

The tenements occupy the site of Greenfield House, one of Morningside earliest mansions, commemorated in the carved tablet at the SW corner. Similar in grand treatment of tenement form to mansion flats by George and Peto as well as Richard Norman Shaw in London, and designed to harmonise with Hippolyte Jean Blanc's earlier tenement to the S.

George Washington Browne, (1853-1939) was a preeminent, Glasgow born architect. He designed the tenement block shortly after establishing independent practice in Edinburgh in 1885.

Listed building record and statutory address updated (2015). Previously listed as '131-151 (odd nos) Bruntsfield Place, 42 Forbes Road and 2 Bruntsfield Gardens'.

External Links

• Historic Environment Scotland Listing
• Wikidata Q17806466

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.

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