Braid Hills Hotel, 134 Braid Road

Braid Hills Hotel

A two-storey and attic hotel built in 1893–94 with 1898 additions, designed by George Lyle and William Constable for the Braid Hills Hotel Company. The building is prominently sited at the foot of the Braid Hills in the Greenbank area of South Edinburgh and is constructed of pale, squared sandstone masonry with red sandstone ashlar dressings.

The design is in the Scots Baronial style. An engaged tower with a conical cap rises at the northwest corner of the principal elevation, with a similar tower on the west elevation. The advanced gables feature stepped corbels, crowstepped skews and ornamental finials. The main windows have carved hood-mouldings, and modillions run at the eaves level. The north elevation has a semi-circular porch at the main entrance. The windows are a mix of timber-framed and plastic replacement units. The roof is covered in grey slate.

The interior, refurbished by 2019, retains elements of its late 19th-century decorative scheme including ornamental cornicing to the ground floor public rooms and principal bedrooms, and hardwood doorcases. The main public staircase has timber bannisters and features decorative stained-glass windows at the half-landing depicting 19th-century Scottish golfers—Ben Sayers from North Berwick and the Kirkaldy brothers from St Andrews. A secondary stair has a curving hardwood handrail and cast iron bannisters.

The site was purchased by the Braid Hills Hotel Company in 1893 for the purpose of erecting a hotel, club house, hydropathic establishment or sanatorium. The hotel opened in October 1894, marketing itself as the 'home of golf' with seventeen golf courses within a fourteen-mile radius. After opening, Braid Road and the surrounding area developed rapidly as a suburban extension from South Morningside.

The single-storey outshot to the east, featuring crossed golf clubs, appears to have been part of the original 1894 design and functioned initially as a golf room with club lockers serving players at the nearby Braid Hills public golf courses. A twelve-bedroom extension in the Baronial style was added to the south in 1898, also by Lyle and Constable. The Edinburgh Suburban Hotels Company was established in 1900 to sell shares in the Braid Hills Hotel and the Barnton Hotel near Cramond to finance expanding business demands.

Further extensions were added to the south during the 1930s, linking the hotel to neighbouring 1–6 Pentland Terrace; the interiors of this terraced row were remodelled to provide additional hotel accommodation. Historical photographs indicate the glazed semi-circular porch was added to the front elevation between 1932 and 1955. The hotel currently comprises 71 bedrooms.

The following are excluded from the listing: the linking block and 1–6 Pentland Terrace to the south, the single-storey addition to the west, and the detached former stable block to the east.