Description

J Russell Walker, 1884-6. 4-storey and attic 3-bay asymmetrical tenement with 17th century Scottish revival detailing, stepped with line of street. Coursed rock-faced sandstone with polished dressings. Corniced ground floor; moulded cill band to 1st , 2nd and attic floors; chequer-set corbelling to right at 2nd floor and under centre 3rd floor window. Roll-moulded tabbed surrounds to transomed windows; band of plain panels over door and left bay; panel with small pediment over rounded corner to outer right at ground. Timber panelled door in shoulder-arched surround with small-pane glazed fanlight over to centre; small segmental pediment over 1st floor window to centre. Long and short quoins; ground floor curved to corner with corbel above. Ball-finialled shaped dormerhead with circular panel in gable over paired windows in left bay; ball-finialled gabletted crowstepped dormerhead with rectangular panel in gable over 2 right bays; gunloop to right.

Small-pane glazing to upper sashes, 4-pane to lower. Grey slates. Corniced L-plan wallhead stack to outer right with circular cans.

Statement of Interest

Identical gableheads at Nos 2 and 4 Upper Bow give unity to an otherwise irregular terrace. Until after the 1827 Improvement Act West Bow was a steep Z-shaped street which climbed from the Grassmarket to Upper Bow at the foot of Castlehill. Most of the old buildings in West and Upper Bow were swept away to make room for the northern side of Victoria Street, built to link the Grassmarket with the new George IV Bridge. Before their demolition, Thomas Hamilton, the architect for the scheme, made careful elevational drawings of the buildings. The old houses on this site survived until 1878, and are described in Grant's OLD AND NEW EDINBURGH.

External Links

• Historic Environment Scotland Listing
• Wikidata Q56632239

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

• 
  Maintaining and Repairing Old Houses: A Guide to Conservation, Sustainability and Economy
• 
  Herefordshire (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Liverpool: Pevsner City Guide (Pevsner Architectural Guides: City Guides)
• 
  Historic Environment Law: Planning, Listed Buildings, Monuments, Conservation Areas and Objects by Harwood, Richard (2012) Paperback
• 
  Suffolk: East (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  For the Record