Convening Rooms, 29 Waterloo Place, Edinburgh

The Convening Rooms, located at 29 Waterloo Place, Edinburgh, is a significant Classical building designed by Archibald Elliot in 1815 and constructed between 1818 and 1819. It occupies a corner site and is designed on a wedge-shaped plan, presenting five bays to Waterloo Place, five bays to the rounded corner, and seven bays to Calton Hill. The building is primarily single-storied, although a two-story section extends to the rear. It is constructed of polished ashlar, with predominantly droved ashlar used on the Calton Hill and rear elevations. Architectural details include a slightly advanced base course, eaves cornice, and a parapet.

The corner elevation features a hexastyle Greek Doric colonnade above a base course surmounted by a chevaux de frise, with a window in each bay. The Waterloo Place elevation has an advanced bay on the left with a recessed window flanked by Greek Doric columns. In the centre, a round-arched doorway is framed by a stilted-arched fanlight and single blank niches on either side. An advanced blank section on the right connects with the corner. The Calton Hill elevation presents an advanced four-bay section on the left, with a blank window in the third bay from the left, and a two-story section to the right incorporating a doorway and varied window arrangements, some bipartite. The western elevation exhibits an advanced two-story section on the left with a single window on the ground floor; a recessed single-story section in the centre with two windows; and an advanced section on the right, largely obscured by the elevated ground level of Old Calton Burying Ground.

The majority of windows are timber sash and case with 12-pane glazing, though some feature 4-pane glazing, particularly in the two-story rear section. The roof is flat, and the building is punctuated by corniced ashlar stacks with predominantly octagonal cans, one on the northeast wallhead, one on the west wallhead, and two centrally on the roof.

Inside, the octagonal entrance lobby, with straight and curved walls, is lit by a cupola. A black painted stone fireplace, featuring a classical foliated design, is present. The main function room, accessible from the lobby, is a large, long room with apsidal ends. A cavetto cornice divides the ceiling into a rectangular section and two semicircles. The north wall includes two consoled classical stone fireplaces, quarter-height wood panelling, and architraved windows. At the east end, there is a raised platform behind a panelled timber partition and architraved windows. The south wall has classical doorpieces on the far left and right, while a two-story curved balcony recess, supported by two cast-iron columns with stiff-leaf capitals, sits centrally beneath a depressed arch. The west end features two curved doors. This room is illuminated by a large, central lozenge-shaped opening with a plaster border to the ceiling and an anthemion and palmette frieze on the inner edge, complemented by a rectangular clerestory above, glazed all around with a flat, covered roof. Ancillary rooms and smaller meeting rooms, also lit by cupolas, complete the remaining interior spaces.