City Chambers, High Street, Edinburgh

The City Chambers, located on the High Street in Edinburgh, is a large, four-storey (ten storeys at the rear) council building constructed between 1754 and 1761 by John Adam and John Fergus, with substantial later additions and alterations. Robert Morham contributed between 1898 and 1904, and Ebenezer J MacRae between 1930 and 1940. The building has a U-shaped plan, featuring an open, arcaded screen facing the High Street, flanked by thirteen-bay wings. It is built of Craigleith stone ashlar, with channelled detailing to the principal elevations, except for the right wing. Architectural features include a dividing band between the ground and first floors, a cill band to the first and second floors, an eaves cornice, and a blocking course. The first-floor windows have Gibbs surrounds, while the second floor windows are set within corniced architraves.

The south elevation to the courtyard displays a seven-bay arcaded loggia on the ground floor, behind a balustraded parapet. The three central bays are slightly advanced and incorporate a tetrastyle centrepiece with fluted Corinthian columns, a pediment, urn finials, foliate sculpture, and the city’s arms in the tympanum.

The east and west elevations to the courtyard are nine bays wide, with tripartite openings featuring fanlights on the ground floor.

The rear, north elevation is regularly fenestrated, with advanced two-bay sections to the left and centre. A projecting wing (Robert Morham, 1901-4) presents Edwardian Baroque detailing, including oeil-de-boeuf windows, a pedimented aedicule, a sculpture group, and a balustraded parapet to the upper storeys.

The High Street facade is marked by a flat-roofed, groin-vaulted, seven-arched ashlar screen with an urn-topped balustraded parapet. This screen includes an armorial pediment with sculpture and the date 1903, and a war memorial is situated beneath the central arch.

The south elevation to the High Street is 13 bays wide, with the outer ten bays designed by Ebenezer J MacRae between 1930 and 1940. It features advanced, piend-roofed, three-bay pavilions, with fanlights over the central ground-floor openings on the left and consoled segmental and triangular pediments above the doors in the centre.

Internally, the building highlights a timber-panelled lobby and stair hall, largely re-fitted in 1936-8. A scale and platt stair incorporates turned balusters and a moulded handrail. The Old Council Room, originally the Board Room of the Customs House, features a Corinthian-columned screen, timber-panelled walls with a dentilled cornice and coved ceiling, doorways with carved friezes and broken pediments, and three niches—the central one containing a bronze statue in Roman armour. A black marble chimneypiece, flanked by a consoled, carved timber surround and a pedimented overmantle with a clock and painting of Edinburgh Castle (1886), completes this space. The New Council Room (Robert Morham, 1901-4) is a timber-panelled rectangular room with Ionic pilasters, screened ends with Ionic columns, a coffered dome with rosettes and a stained-glass cupola, a timber balustraded public gallery, and an armorial chimneypiece. The Dining Room offers paired, fluted Ionic pilasters and wall paintings of historical scenes by William Hole (1903-9).

Primarily, the windows are timber sash and case, with plate glass. Corniced ashlar stacks feature circular cans, while cast iron downpipes include decorative hoppers. The roof is covered in grey slates.