1 Queen Charlotte Street, Leith, Edinburgh

11, 13, 15, and 17 Queen Charlotte Street in Leith, Edinburgh, is a large group of four three-storey and attic tenements with shops on the ground floor, designed by R Paterson and Son and dated 1878. The buildings are constructed from cream sandstone, with ashlar on the south and southwest sides, squared and snecked stugged rubble with polished dressings on the east, and squared and snecked rubble on the rear.

The tenements follow the slope of the street and turn two corners. They feature a base course, unaltered shopfronts with shouldered-arch openings, recessed doorways, panelled stall risers, and a dentilled stepped cornice. There is a band course above the ground and first floors, a cill band course at the second floor, and a heavily bracketted eaves cornice. The tenements are divided by channelled pilasters topped with segmental pedimented and domed dies finials on paired brackets. The windows are architraved, with shouldered designs at the first floor, and have bracketted cills. The round-headed dormers are slate-hung, and the doorways leading to the common stairs feature iron grilles as fanlights.

On the south elevation facing Queen Charlotte Street, the tenement on the outer right has an ornate splayed corner bay framed by pilasters, a tall doorway at the ground floor with a two-leaf panelled door, and a wallhead that breaks the eaves into a bracketted semi-circular headed panel with a sculptured heraldic date and an acroterion at the apex. The remaining bays have windows and dormers. The tenement on the outer left features a bowed corner bay, with single windows in all other bays and both single and bipartite dormers.

The southwest elevation facing Water Street has four bays, with shopfronts framing the common stair doorway at the ground floor, and single windows along with single and bipartite dormers above. The east elevation facing Maritime Street has three bays, with a common stair doorway and shopfronts at the ground floor, single windows, and single dormers above, along with a wallhead stack to the left. The north rear elevation has single windows, some breaking the eaves, single slate-hung dormers, and two wallhead stacks, along with a mansard roof addition facing Water Street.

The windows are 4-pane timber sash and case. The roofs are mainly covered with grey slate, with some green and purple slate and metal flashings. There are three wallhead stacks and mutual stacks, along with a moulded eaves gutter. The interior was not seen in 1993.