5 New Street, Canongate, Edinburgh

This is a two-storey former school building of 1900-1, designed by Robert Wilson, located on the Canongate in Edinburgh. The building exhibits Queen Anne detailing, characterised by shaped gables, and a square-plan bellcote featuring columns supporting a slated, swept roof culminating in a gilded cockerel weathervane. The exterior is constructed from coursed bull-faced sandstone with red sandstone dressings. A base course is present, along with an eaves cornice. The stonework includes long and short quoins, raised margins, and tabbed surrounds. The site slopes, with the north side having an embankment constructed of random coursed bull-faced sandstone retaining wall below playground level, topped with iron railings. Windows on the east side of Market Street now accommodate offices and workshops.

The east (New Street) elevation is asymmetrical, arranged in three groups of three bays. The three bays to the right feature a bipartite window centrally, a gablet with an apex stack and scrolled skewputts above, and steps leading to a two-leaf timber panelled door within a Gibbs surround and pulvinated frieze. A small window sits above the door, flanked by carved foliate scrolls. The centre bay has stone-mullioned windows; a piend-roofed dormerhead with a Venetian window breaks the eaves above. A shaped dormerhead breaks the eaves above the centre window to the left.

The west (rear) elevation mirrors the east, featuring a flat-coped dormerhead on the right.

The north (East Market Street) elevation is symmetrical, with nine bays. The two outer bays are slightly advanced with gabled forms; first-floor windows have Gibbs surrounds and keyed oculi above. A recessed five-bay range links the outer bays, with a slightly advanced centre bay featuring a corniced, pilastered window and a bell-cast roof. Tall mullioned and transomed windows are positioned in the stairwells flanking this central bay.

The south elevation is also symmetrical, featuring shaped gables to the outer bays (with circular panels in the gables) and offset windows. Piend-roofed and shaped dormerheads break the eaves in the third bays from the left and right.

The building has timber sash and case windows with 12-pane glazing, and grey slate pitched roofs. The stone skews have scrolled skewputts. Corniced apex stacks are topped with circular cans. Cast-iron downpipes incorporate decorative hoppers.

The interior includes a glazed white tiled entrance vestibule and a central galleried hall with a continuous glazed rooflight. The hall’s timber supports feature arch bracing and tie beams with carved scroll hammer braces. Former classrooms are off the ground floor and a parquet-floored gallery at the first floor. Plain iron railings with timber banisters are present. Stairwells on the north side have white glazed tiles to dado level, with a plain ochre-coloured border.

Boundary walls are topped with a coped sandstone retaining wall featuring plain iron railings. Gatepiers mark the New Street entrance, with platform copes and rusticated bands, and a later overthrow.