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Summary

Description

Robert Wilson, 1884-5. Symmetrical, plain Gothic church, originally part of continuous street frontage. Squared, snecked and stugged sandstone with cream ashlar dressings; lancet windows, chamfered arrises.

NE (MADEIRA STREET) ELEVATION: 3-bay gabled elevation to nave at centre; square-headed bipartite windows with stop-chamfered arrises to basement; bipartite windows to principal floor, lighting main hall, with moulded string course above; tripartite gallery window, central light with stained glass and date stone 1884 below; 3 blind arrowslits above in gablehead; flanking buttresses. Flanking entrance and staircase pavilions of 2 closely grouped bays at a lower level; steps from street arch over basement area to inner bays with 2-leaf panelled doors in roll-moulded lancet-headed surround with columns and crocketed foliate capitals; solid tympanum; bipartite window above; outer bays with single windows to both storeys; moulded cill-course to upper storey; plain eaves.

NW AND SE ELEVATIONS: 3 closely grouped bays to rear with windows to hall and gallery.

SW ELEVATION: irregular elevation with projecting offices.

2-,3- and 4-light plate glass windows; sash and case to basement and offices. Grey slates; ashlar coped skews and apex stack.

INTERIOR: separate galleries to sides and rear, supported on cast-iron columns, fronts panelled with foliate plaster enrichments. Second tier of columns (bosses at front) supporting arched braces of boarded roof, with skylights and flat upper ceiling; staircase halls in front corners, with glazed partitions at ground. Raised dais at rear of church (pulpit removed and central blind arch boxed in) with sunken baptistry; panelled rear wall formerly held memorials, since moved to sides. At ground, pews removed and carpet installed throughout; tiered pews remain in galleries. Stained glass windows at ground and galleries by Alexander Kerr, 1945; one window to Madeira Street by Emma Aiken, 1988. Hall below, with later partitions.

FRONT WALL AND RAILINGS: saddleback ashlar base for spiked wrought-iron railings; finials at corners.

Statement of Special Interest

Ecclesiastical building in use as such. A corrugated-iron church was erected on the site in 1875, and opened on the 10th October; it was the first place of worship specifically built by the Baptists in Leith. The current building replacing it was opened on 12th June 1885, the foundation stone having been laid in June 1884. It cost about £3,300, and has accommodation for about 600 people. The church was redecorated in 1989 and the pews and pulpit removed in 1991. The front gable formerly had a finial, and behind this at the apex of the roof there was a decorative octagonal capped ventilator.

References

Bibliography

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