Listed Building

The only legal part of the listing under the Planning (Listing Buildings and Conservation Areas) (Scotland) Act 1997 is the address/name of site. Addresses and building names may have changed since the date of listing – see 'About Listed Buildings' below for more information. The further details below the 'Address/Name of Site' are provided for information purposes only.

Address/Name of Site

1 LAURISTON PLACE, EDINBURGH ROYAL INFIRMARY, MAIN BLOCK, INCLUDING LINKED ORIGINAL WARD PAVILIONSLB30306

Status: Designated

Documents

There are no additional online documents for this record.

Summary

Category
A
Group Category Details
100000019 - see notes
Date Added
31/05/1994
Local Authority
Edinburgh
Planning Authority
Edinburgh
Burgh
Edinburgh
NGR
NT 25489 72992
Coordinates
325489, 672992

Description

David Bryce, 1872-9. Symmetrical 3-storey and attic Scots Baronial hospital with 4 pavilions projecting to N and 2 to S; later alterations and additions. Pale coursed bull-faced Hailes sandstone with ashlar dressings. Tall Franco-Scots-inspired turreted square central entrance tower and lucarned spire with decorative flashings, flanked by tall corniced ashlar chimney stacks; corner bartizans with projecting water-spouts and clock faces to N and S; inscription panels and commemorative date stone (1729-1870) over door (see Notes). Finialled and lucarned fish-scale slated conical roofs to circular corner towers (possibly derived from those at Falkland Palace) of pavilions (now linked by glazed balconies), with crowstepped gables between.

N (LAURISTON PLACE) ELEVATION: advanced asymmetrical centre block; 2-leaf glazed timber door with 2-pane fanlight in angled, moulded surround with carved panel above (see Notes); flanked by narrow hoodmoulded stone-transomed windows, with inscribed panels above (see Notes). Tripartite hoodmoulded stone-mullioned and -transomed window with date panel (see Notes) to 1st floor; tall tripartite round-arched stone-mullioned and -transomed window to 3rd; machicolation below clock face; gabletted buttress to left below turret; corbelling at 1st floor to circular turret with arrow-slit windows to right; lucarned ventilators and decorative cast-iron cresting to roof; weathervane on spire. Stone-mullioned and -transomed 2-light windows to ground, 1st and breaking eaves with pedimented dormerheads in 3 flanking bays; finialled, conical-roofed bartizans to outer corners. Recessed 2-bay linking blocks with large stone-mullioned and -transomed, shoulder-arched windows at ground, 1st, and 2nd floors, tripartite windows above.

S ELEVATION: much obscured by later additions.

E AND W ELEVATIONS OF PAVILIONS: 2-bay gabled blocks with intervening single bays, regularly fenestrated. Crowstepped gables to innermost and outermost elevations; bartizans to innermost block at angle of southern 2 bays.

INTERIOR: framed boards with gilt lettering in entrance hall, corridor and stair (see Notes). Board-room has good original plasterwork and joinery - doors, panelling, shutters etc.

Tall windows to wards, top hopper above, some sash and case below (see Notes). Cast-iron down pipes with some decorative hoppers. Stone skews. Grey slates.

Statement of Special Interest

A group comprises Lodge (with gatepiers and railings), Main Block, Medical Pavilions (including Jubilee Pavilion), former Nurses' Home, former Ear, Nose and Throat and Ophthalmic Blocks and Chalmers Hospital. Founded in 1729, the Royal Infirmary was Scotland's first hospital specifically intended for the care of the sick. Initially it was housed in an old building at the head of Robertson's Close, in what is now Infirmary Street (commemorated in a plaque on the wall of James Thin's Bookshop), then in a much larger building, designed by William Adam (foundation stone laid 1738, opened in 1741) and located between what are now Infirmary Street and Drummond Street. The hospital was granted a Royal Charter by George II in 1736. The King's statue (separately listed) can be seen to the right, outside the main entrance. The earliest building on the present site was George Watson's Hospital (1738-41), also designed by William Adam, fragments of which are incorporated into the building by John Lessels (separately listed) situated to the S of the main block. This building and its grounds were sold by the Merchant Company to the Corporation of the Royal Infirmary in 1870. The new Medical School, designed by Rowand Anderson, was also building on the adjacent site at the same time. The foundation stone of the Infirmary (a plaque indicates that this was at the corner of the NE pavilion) was laid by the Prince of Wales in 1870, and it was opened in November 1879. In its planning it shows the influence of the continental pavilion-plan hospitals advocated by Florence Nightingale, and of St Thomas's Hospital, London (designed by Henry Currey, a pupil of Decimus Burton, and built in 1868-71). The Illustrated London News acknowledges Bryce's infirmary (completed, after Bryce's death in 1876, under the supervision of his nephew, John Bryce) as 'the largest hospital in the United Kingdom, and probably the best planned.' Florence Nightingale's principals of hospital planning were adopted, and her detailed approval obtained. Each ward was designed to be self-contained, with waiting room, nurses' room, physicians' room, kitchen, lavatories and bathrooms; lifts were provided for patients' beds and (separately) for stores. Administration, teaching rooms, theatres etc were in the main block. Window arrangements for wards, with top hoppers over sash and case windows (to permit ventilation even in bad weather), remained popular for hospitals well into the 20th century. The ventilation system was also regarded innovative. The Infirmary cost ?340,000, and was intended to serve 550-600 patients. The furnishing of each ward cost ?400-?480, and the funding was raised by voluntary effort. Boards in the hall, corridors and staircase of the main block commemorate the donors both to this hospital and to the previous one (the Infirmary was dependent on charitable donations until 1948). Important portraits hang in the Board Room. The inscriptions over the door of the main block (PATET OMNIBUS, with a pelican, above the door, I WAS A STRANGER AND YE TOOK ME IN to the left, and I WAS SICK AND YE VISITED ME to the right) were copied in 1885 from those at William Adam's Infirmary.

References

Bibliography

Original Royal Infirmary (William Adam) Vitruvius Scoticus Plate 150. Drawings in Infirmary architect's and archivist's offices. Minutes of Royal Infirmary vols 23&24, 1871-76. RSA 1871. ILLUSTRATED LONDON NEWS 11th November, 1879. AL Turner THE ROYAL INFIRMARY OF EDINBURGH 1729-1929 (1929). AL Turner STORY OF A GREAT HOSPITAL (1937). Fiddes and Rowan MR DAVID BRYCE (1976) pp 97-98. Gifford, McWilliam and Walker EDINBURGH (1984) pp 259-60. Richardson, Harriet ENGLISH HOSPITALS 1660-1948 (1998) pp30-31.

About Listed Buildings

Historic Environment Scotland is responsible for designating sites and places at the national level. These designations are Scheduled monuments, Listed buildings, Inventory of gardens and designed landscapes and Inventory of historic battlefields.

We make recommendations to the Scottish Government about historic marine protected areas, and the Scottish Ministers decide whether to designate.

Listing is the process that identifies, designates and provides statutory protection for buildings of special architectural or historic interest as set out in the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) (Scotland) Act 1997.

We list buildings which are found to be of special architectural or historic interest using the selection guidance published in Designation Policy and Selection Guidance (2019)

Listed building records provide an indication of the special architectural or historic interest of the listed building which has been identified by its statutory address. The description and additional information provided are supplementary and have no legal weight.

These records are not definitive historical accounts or a complete description of the building(s). If part of a building is not described it does not mean it is not listed. The format of the listed building record has changed over time. Earlier records may be brief and some information will not have been recorded.

The legal part of the listing is the address/name of site which is known as the statutory address. Other than the name or address of a listed building, further details are provided for information purposes only. Historic Environment Scotland does not accept any liability for any loss or damage suffered as a consequence of inaccuracies in the information provided. Addresses and building names may have changed since the date of listing. Even if a number or name is missing from a listing address it will still be listed. Listing covers both the exterior and the interior and any object or structure fixed to the building. Listing also applies to buildings or structures not physically attached but which are part of the curtilage (or land) of the listed building as long as they were erected before 1 July 1948.

While Historic Environment Scotland is responsible for designating listed buildings, the planning authority is responsible for determining what is covered by the listing, including what is listed through curtilage. However, for listed buildings designated or for listings amended from 1 October 2015, legal exclusions to the listing may apply.

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