53 Queen Street, Edinburgh

These are a mirrored pair of three-storey, basement and attic classical houses dating from around 1790. In 1857, Peter Hamilton added an attic and a rear extension to No. 52. The interior of No. 53 was modernised in the earlier 19th century. The houses are constructed of droved Craigleith sandstone ashlar with polished dressings. The ground floors feature channelled rustication, while a cill course runs across the first floor. The windows have simple moulded architraves and cornices at the first floor. No. 52 has cornices at both the second floor and a full attic storey, whereas No. 53 has a single corniced slate-hung box dormer with three windows arranged in a bipartite pattern at its centre. The inner bays have tripartite, pilastered doorpieces with panelled doors, stylised capitals, fluted friezes adorned with rosettes, and fanlights; No. 52’s fanlight has four arched panes, while No. 53’s is plate glass.

The rear elevations are of coursed rubble, massively extended from the left bay of No. 52, with a Venetian window at first floor level to the right. The attic windows are breaking the eaves. No. 53 features a projecting right bay, a tripartite window to the left bay at both ground and first floors, a former doorway on the right at ground floor level with a plat oversailing the basement, and original timber sash and case windows; plate glass windows are found in No. 52, and 12-pane windows in No. 53. The roofs have ashlar coped mutual skews, lead covered at the centre, and dressed stone mutual stacks, reduced at the centre, and are covered with grey slates.

The interior of No. 52 has been heavily rebuilt in a Jacobethan style, but retains its original staircase with decorative cast-iron banisters. No. 53 features a tripartite screen to the inner hall and a longitudinal central staircase to the left with alternating decorative cast-iron banisters. The former Dining Room has an apsidal end with a full-height recess, panelled dado and a black slate chimneypiece. A plain black slate chimneypiece is in the rear right room, which has a tripartite window. The former Drawing Room on the first floor has an enriched ceiling with wheat ears in an oval, panelled dado, 19th-century plaster panelled walls, a rich cornice, and a white marble chimneypiece with an egg-and-dart cornice and a brass grate set within a tiled insert featuring decorative Islamic tiles. A pair of double doors, corniced with clasping pilasters, leads to the former Rear Drawing Room which has an en suite cornice and a corresponding doorpiece, a fluted Corinthian screen, and a white marble chimneypiece with a brass enriched register grate. The upper floors have been considerably altered; a timber stair leads to the attic floor, which has a landing opening onto the stair with cast-iron banisters. A splayed tunnel to a stairlight is enriched with trailing foliage. Cast-iron spearhead railings are present.