Any frequent business traveller will tell you that the hassle far outstrips the occasional perk of a nice expense account dinner or a drive by foreign hot spots. But if you don’t get to travel much in your job, then the rare work-related jaunt can be a thing of immense excitement.
But in exchange I got Edinburgh.
We smashed all of our business objectives and I, thanks to the inconveniently-scheduled homeward flight, was able to grab 4.5 hours for myself to ramble around one of the world’s greatest Georgian cities beneath clement skies that made everything look postcard-perfect.
(And lest you think I was skiving, I made up almost every minute of the time working in the airport and on the flight home. No rest for the wicked.)
There are, of course, plenty of things to do in this ancient city that aren’t Georgian. A first time-tourist would probably stroll up the hugely picturesque Royal Mile to visit the castle. I’ve done that enough times to know it’s one of those castles that’s actually a lot more dramatic inside than out. I seriously considered Holyrood, the Queen’s official palace in Scotland. There’s both history and more bang for your art and interiors buck there, and I haven’t been inside for at least 20 years. I decided I wanted to do something entirely new to me, however, so headed for The Georgian House on Charlotte Square.
The walk through Edinburgh’s New Town to get there was as good as the attraction.
By the middle of the 18th century the city, then confined to the medieval footprint stretching from the castle to Holyrood, was bursting at its dank, dangerous seams. Meanwhile, Scots were playing an ever-increasing role in the politics and culture of the still newly-United Kingdom. They wanted a capital that matched their contribution in the Age of Enlightenment. They also wanted to affirm their loyalty to the king in London after the Scottish-based rebellion in 1745. The result was a massive, gracious, purpose-built urban expansion running on a parallel hill to the Old Town. The architectural style matched what was going on in London, Bath and Dublin, while all the street names broadcast allegiance to the throne.
George Street runs along the crest of the New Town’s hill, with views of the Old Town and the castle to the south and down to the Firth of Forth to the north. On a sunny day, with the whole scene framed by blue skies, blue waters and green hills, it’s one of the best settings for an urban walk in Europe. The buildings along this double-width avenue are almost entirely neo-classical; some have the restrained dignity of Tuscan villas, others the Baroque embellishment of palaces. Edinburgh may be known as the Athens of the North, but George Street sweeps you away to Italy. Anglo-Saxon restraint keeps things from getting out of control, however.
There’s an amusing “compare and contrast” to be had if you wander into the church of St. Andrew’s and St. George’s and picture it beside San’Andrea al Quirinale in Rome. The churches share an unusual oval footprint, they both look back to Greek and Roman design, and the Roman St. Andrew’s is home to Scotttish Catholics in that city, but there all similarities stop. While the Roman church is a breath-stealing, gold encrusted exercise is excess, the Scottish church is restrained, elegant and mostly white, its only exuberance being colourful Robert Adam-style plasterwork on its ceiling.
As the most famous architect of the age and a Scot by birth, it’s no surprise that Adam’s influence is felt here though his actual contribution is limited. What he did, however, it arguably the most beautiful bit of the whole New Town. Adam designed Charlotte Square along the same lines as Paris’ Place des Vosges, with individual residences blending into what appears to be a single, unified palace. The north and south sides have grand central pediments, while the west is centred on a domed church, now the Scottish National Records Office. (It’s not by Adam, but fits seamlessly into the scheme.) The park in the middle is a private one for residents only, but is mostly just green lawn, making the building facades look even better.
The Georgian House is at No. 7, originally purchased and furnished by the chief of Clan Lamont and now in the hands of the National Trust for Scotland. (National Trust for England and Wales cards are honoured here.) Like the castle, the exterior is a bit more impressive than the interior, but if you’re a fan of the Georgians and Robert Adam it’s a fascinating comparison to his English work. While the classic lines, familiar motifs, sash windows and grand stairs are here, everything is smaller and simpler. The staircase with its oval skylight at the top is the only one in the house; no separate servants’ option here. There are no flamboyant Adam plaster ceilings. Each floor has just two main rooms.
In stark contrast to the usual Georgian townhouse plan, houses here followed a Scottish tradition of keeping a combined audience and bedchamber on the ground floor next to the dining room. Above, a drawing room stretches the width of the house at the front while a library sits behind it. Bedrooms would have been on upper floors. These aren’t restored to Georgian times but used as galleries for temporary exhibitions and as a cinema room where you can watch an excellent film about life in the house in Lord Lamont’s time. It would have been the height of luxury in turn of the 19th-century Edinburgh, but would have come across as a distinct step down from townhouses in London or Bath. (No. 1 Royal Crescent in Bath, also restored and open as a museum, is probably the Georgian House’s most direct tourism contemporary in England.) I wonder if Nicola Sturgeon, whose official residence is in Bute House next door, notices and adds the inferiority to her list of grievances against the English?
At the other end of George Street there’s another square, St. Andrew’s, and No. 39 there can keep up with anything in London. Although that may be due to its origin 80 years later as a bank headquarters rather than as a private home. Now it’s the sumptuous Gleneagles Townhouse, urban outpost of the famous golfing resort. This isn’t the kind of place one gets put up in on business trips … the website doesn’t even list prices for its exquisitely appointed rooms … but you can make reservations to dine here or even, as we did, get lucky and slip in for a table in the bar for drinks. Both restaurant and bar are in what was the main hall of the bank, with towering marble columns, grand fireplaces and a coved ceiling offering heroes of Scotland in high relief amongst decorative swirls.
My lodgings were in the far more sensible Apex Hotel at Waterloo place, which had none of Gleneagles’ opulence but everything you really care about when travelling on business: quiet rooms with effective, individually-controlled heating and air conditioning, a great bed, an indoor pool and gym with long hours so you have some chance of squeezing some exercise into your day, and a quiet restaurant with a broad, practical menu that allows you to get something to eat on your own without a big fuss at the end of the day. It’s also exceptionally well located, just a few minutes’ stroll from both the train station and the terminus of the tram line in from the airport. (At £9 for an open-ended return on a gleaming, air-conditioned tram that glides you from point-to-point with hardly a bump, this has to be one of the best deals in public transport in the UK.)
A few other points to note from my visit:
St. James Quarter is a glistening new, galleria-inspired shopping centre just north of the main train station. In my youth, this was a downmarket area where you could find B&Bs for £6 a night where you fed 20 pence coins into the radiator for some feeble warmth to keep the ancient cold at bay. That’s all been swept away for upscale brands and dining variety. I might be distressed at losing all that historic architecture if they hadn’t done the new stuff so well, and if it wasn’t completely surrounded by historic neighbourhoods in great shape.
The Everyman Cinema within the mall is purpose built, a divergence from the chain’s usual approach of re-working historic buildings. They’ve retained the sofa seating, however, and doubled down on the whole nightclub cum cinema vibe. There are two floors of dining and drinking area here to augment the screening rooms. Which made it a fabulous venue for a corporate event, with presentations in the cinema and drinks afterwards in the upper lounge, set aside for private use.
The Scottish National Gallery, like all of the UK’s national museums, is free to enter. It’s also tiny. Which makes it a fabulous stop if you’re walking on nearby Princes Street. Head to the back building for the core of the collection, displayed in six galleries that circle one floor of what appears to be a Greek temple. The collection may be small but the masterpiece percentage is high, with works from Botticelli, Raphael, Titian, El Greco, Velázquez, Rembrandt, Vermeer, Gainsborough, Constable, Turner and more. There’s even an exquisite little DaVinci, the Madonna of the Yarnwinder. But for me, the star sight is Landseer’s Monarch of the Glen, which has always seemed to me to be the essence of Scotland on canvas.
The Eastern European pop giving atmosphere to Miros Cantina Mexicana, didn’t undermine the experience in this delightful little find on Rose Street, a lane of eclectic restaurants between the better-known Princes and George Streets. Despite the vast diversity of people and cuisines in the UK, Mexican is rarely done well here. I’d have been ecstatic to find this near me. Instead, succulent carnitas tacos and cold beer added to the perfection, if not the Georgian theme, of my Edinburgh afternoon of escape.
Did you know that the Walter Scott Memorial, ground zero for sightseeing in Edinburgh, is the largest monument in the world dedicated to a writer? And they commemorated the man for eternity with one of his favourite dogs by his side. Makes me want to dust off my copy of Waverley and tuck in once more.
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