Building Through Pend, 123 Constitution Street, Leith, Edinburgh

This is a substantial, two-storey, attic, and basement office building with a warehouse to the rear, constructed in 1898 to a design by Robert Macfarlane Cameron. The building is located at 123 Constitution Street, Leith, Edinburgh.

The front elevation is symmetrical and features thirteen bays, with a central pend creating a throughway. The architecture is characterized by heavy Mannerist detailing and substantial ornamentation. The building is constructed of cream sandstone with polished ashlar to the front and side elevations, contrasting with squared and snecked rubble to the rear. The warehouse behind is also built of squared and snecked rubble with droved dressings. A polished red granite base course is visible on the front, with inset basement windows. A cill course runs along the ground and first floors, and a frieze and cornice are present above the ground floor. Eaves cornices are also present, along with gabled end and centre bays featuring banded angle pilasters at ground floor level. Cartouche carvings decorate the frieze, and at the first floor, paired windows are flanked by fluted bands and Corinthianesque capitals, although the capital is missing from the right end bay. The windows have rounded reveals and fillets, with mullions and transoms. Pedimented gables are adorned with lugs and kneelers.

The principal (northwest) elevation has three slightly advanced gabled centre bays. A round-arched pend is centrally located, featuring stepped voussoirs around a scrolled keystone. Above the pend, a bowed quadripartite oriel is flanked by pilasters. An oculus is situated within the gablehead, flanked by short shafts and blank square panels, topped by a ball finial. The bays flanking the pend contain round-arched and keystoned doorways with impost courses, double-leaf panelled doors, and semi-circular fanlights featuring radial iron astragals. Elaborate doorpieces include polished red granite pedestaled columns with composite capitals and cartouche carvings. An open pediment with a shell motif sits above, along with a corniced window at the first floor. The four bays flanking these are punctuated by single windows at ground and first floor. The gabled end bays have two bipartite windows at ground floor, with a secondary doorway positioned beneath the outer-left window. A tripartite bowed oriel, detailed similarly to the central one, sits above, incorporating a half-doomed roof.

The rear (southeast) elevation features a round-arched pend with a nepus gable above, alongside irregular single and bipartite windows. Two wallhead stacks are present. A single-storey link connects to the warehouse on the right side.

The southwest (Links Lane) elevation is three bays wide, featuring a band course above ground floor. The centre bay contains bipartite windows on both the ground and first floors, with single windows on the outer bays. A truncated, shouldered wallhead stack is located to the left of the centre. The northeast elevation mirrors this design.

The warehouse has a rectangular footprint and single windows. The northeast elevation has seven bays with raised margins and segmental-arched lintels. The southwest courtyard elevation, with six bays, originally had a raised walkway, formerly glazed. A mansard roof is fitted with a lift/loading tower on the southwest side.

The windows throughout are timber sash and case, with two and three panes, while the warehouse windows incorporate barred four-pane arrangements. Slate roofing with metal flashings covers the building, and it’s complemented by four wallhead stacks, transverse stacks, a mansard roof to the warehouse, coped skews, a moulded eaves gutter.