Leith Baptist Church, 27, 29 Madeira Street, Edinburgh

Robert Wilson designed this church in 1884-5, built in a plain Gothic style. Originally, it formed part of a continuous street frontage. The church is constructed from squared, snecked and stugged sandstone with cream ashlar dressings, featuring lancet windows and chamfered arrises.

The north-east elevation, facing Madeira Street, has a three-bay gabled section, representing the nave. It contains square-headed bipartite windows in the basement, with stop-chamfered arrises. Above these are bipartite windows illuminating the main hall, punctuated by a moulded string course. A tripartite gallery window is centrally positioned, featuring stained glass and a date stone from 1884 below. Three blind arrowslits are set into the gablehead, flanked by buttresses. Either side of the main gabled section are lower pavilions housing the entrance and staircase, each consisting of two closely spaced bays. Steps lead from a street arch, above a basement area, to inner bays with two-leaf panelled doors within a roll-moulded, lancet-headed surround featuring columns and crocketed foliate capitals. A solid tympanum sits above the doorway, with a bipartite window above the entrance. The outer bays have single windows on both storeys. A moulded cill course runs along the upper storey, and the eaves are plain. The north-west and south-east elevations have three closely grouped bays overlooking the rear of the building, featuring windows serving the hall and gallery. The south-west elevation is irregular due to the projecting offices.

The church’s windows are mostly 2-, 3- and 4-light plate glass, with sash and case windows in the basement and offices. The roof is covered in grey slates with ashlar coped skews and an apex stack.

Inside, there are galleries on both sides and at the rear, supported by cast-iron columns. The gallery fronts are panelled with foliate plasterwork. A second tier of columns, featuring bosses at the front, supports arched braces for the boarded roof, which incorporates skylights and a flat upper ceiling. Staircase halls are located in the front corners, separated by glazed partitions at ground level. A raised dais at the rear, formerly incorporating the pulpit and a central blind arch, now contains a sunken baptistry. A panelled rear wall, which once held memorials, now has these moved to the sides. Ground-level pews have been removed and replaced with carpeting, however tiered pews remain in the galleries. Stained glass windows are present on the ground floor and in the galleries - one on Madeira Street is by Alexander Kerr (1945) and another by Emma Aiken (1988). A hall is located below.

The front wall is finished with a saddleback ashlar base for spiked wrought-iron railings with finials at the corners.