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Summary

Description

David Cousin, 1842-3; re-faced at rear, Wardrop and Reid, 1882; later alterations. 3-storey, 2-bay neo-Norman former church. Polished cream sandstone ashlar with polished dressings; droved sandstone ashlar to basement at rear. NW (Rutland Place) elevation: base course; cavetto moulded string course to ground floor, at springing of round-arched openings; overlapping blind arcaded frieze below chevron-patterned cornice to 1st floor of bow; chevron-patterned cill course to blind arcade at 1st floor to bay to right, with cill course to smaller blind arcade above (obscured by bow at left); cill course to both bays at 2nd floor; band course following gableheads; coped skews. Bays divided at 2nd floor by piers with nook shaft angles, dentil cornices and arcaded caps. Rear (Rutland Street) elevation: band course between basement and ground floor; cill course to 1st floor; complex round-arch spanning paired-arch frieze below cornice and parapet. Chamfered reveals to mullioned and transomed basement windows; nook shafts supporting round-arched bipartites at ground floor; similar at 1st floor with spanning round arch and centred oculus.

NW (RUTLAND PLACE) ELEVATION: 2-bay; paired gables; 2-storey bow to ground and 1st floors of bay to left, nook shafts supporting multi-moulded round-arched doorpiece with pitched roof to bay to ground floor; modern glazed 2-leaf doors with infilled semicircular fanlight; carved blind fretwork beneath gablehead with dentil moulding; oculus to left of doorway; paired doorways to ground floor at bay to right, converted to window with dentil-moulded apron at outer right; 2-leaf timber door with gothic small-pane fanlight to doorway at left; nook shafts support multi-moulded round-headed openings; assortment of rosette, chevron, animal-head and other ornamental motifs to mouldings; nook shafts and ornamental mouldings to 3 evenly disposed lights at 1st floor of bay to left; moulded overlapping round arches to blind arcade to 1st floor of bay to right; recessed moulding to blind arcade above; 3 evenly disposed windows with nook shafts and chevron mouldings to both gables at 2nd floor, with quatrefoil windows to each gablehead.

SE (RUTLAND STREET) ELEVATION: 2-storey and basement, 5-bay; near-symmetrical; bipartite window in each bay at basement (truncated beneath oversailing porch); replacement timber door with segmental fanlight in penultimate bay to left. Gabled entrance porch oversails basement in bay to right of centre; nook shafts support chevron-moulded round-arched doorpiece, with Celtic cross finial; round-arched bipartites to each return; windows to all remaining bays at ground and 1st floors.

NE AND SW ELEVATIONS: obscured by adjoining buildings.

Leaded windows to NW elevation and to returns to portal at rear; aluminium frames to remaining windows at rear; windows at basement partially louvred. Grey slate roof; coped skews. Common ashlar coped multi-flue stacks. Cast-iron rainwater goods.

INTERIOR: not seen 1999.

RAILINGS, PIERS AND LAMP STANDARDS: decorative wrought-iron railings on ashlar cope along rear elevation; railing-mounted iron lamp standard with glass globe and drum well to right of entrance; ashlar piers with triangular-headed panels; spear-headed railings to left of entrance at rear.

Statement of Special Interest

Part of the Edinburgh New Town A-Group, a significant surviving part of one of the most important and best preserved examples of urban planning in Britain. No longer in ecclesiastical use. Originally Church of Scotland, then premises for the Scottish Tourist Board, now a casino. The exuberant and richly decorative neo-Norman front of this building makes a striking contrast with the surrounding Georgian development. From the entrance a geometric stair leads to gallery level, where a floor was inserted circa 1958. The roof is groin-vaulted and, where piers would be expected, are to be found elaborately arched trusses with pendants. The rear elevation is more restrained than the front, the result of a reworking by Wardrop and Reid in 1882. Prior to this, as envisioned in Elliot's initial scheme (which features on the PO Directory map of 1840), it had been classical in character.

References

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