Description

1825 incorporating earlier fabric (see Notes). 5-storey, 7-bay tenement with distinctive round-arched window treatment to 1st floor right. Pilastered timber shops-fronts to ground. Ashlar (painted at 1st floor). Raised cills. Langley-Gothick doorway at No 156 inscribed 'Mary's Chapel'. Narrow round-arched pend opening to centre leading to Covenant Close. 5 round-arched openings with Y-tracery glazing to 1st floor right alternating in size with balustraded, pilastered and corniced moulding to centre 3 bays. Pair of bi-partite piended dormers to left and pair of single dormers to right.

Predominantly 12-pane timber sash and case windows. Scottish slate. Particularly broad brick and ashlar stacks. Clay cans. Cast-iron rainwater goods.

Statement of Interest

No 156-166 is a simple and refined traditional tenement building that contributes significantly to the fine run of tenements situated on the South side of the High Street. Reconstructed after the fire of 1824, this elegant tenement block provides considerable streetscape interest. The round arched 1st floor section is of particular interest. It retains its original glazing and balustrading at cill level and was formerly the High Street Post Office.

The High Street is located at the heart of the Old Town and has World Heritage Site status. Historically the central focus of public, civic and commercial life within the city, the High Street contains many of Edinburgh's most distinguished buildings including St Giles Kirk and Parliament Hall (see separate listings). Its special architectural and historic interest as one of Edinburgh's primary thoroughfares is unparalleled.

List description updated at resurvey (2007/08).

External Links

• Historic Environment Scotland Listing
• Wikidata Q17809282

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.

Recommended Books

• 
  Sussex: East with Brighton and Hove (Buildings of England) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Development and Design of Heritage Sensitive Sites: Strategies for Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas
• 
  Suffolk: West: The Buildings of England (Pevsner Architectural Guides) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990: Updated version
• 
  Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990
• 
  [(Bedfordshire, Huntingdon and Peterborough)] [By (author) Nikolaus Pevsner] published on (January, 1968)