20, 21 Hillside Crescent, Edinburgh

This is a long, classical tenement range dating from the 1880s, designed by John Chesser. It is situated on Hillside Crescent in Edinburgh, with additional elevations facing Hillside Street and Wellington Street. The building is near-symmetrical, with four storeys and a basement to the right-hand side. It features a central 14-bay section, flanked by advanced eight-bay (seven-bay to ground floor) pavilions on either side, and a five-bay elevation to Hillside Street. The Wellington Street elevation is four-storey with a five-bay frontage.

The exterior is constructed of polished ashlar, with coursed rubble and dressed margins to the rear. Architectural detailing includes a base course, dividing band between the ground and first floors, moulded cill courses to the first and second floors, a modillioned cornice dividing the second and third floors (on the Hillside Crescent elevation only), a cill band to the third floor, an eaves cornice, and a blocking course. Window fenestration is predominantly regular, with architraves to ground floor, first, second, and third floor windows (excluding canted bays); aprons are present on first-floor windows.

The principal southern elevation (Hillside Crescent) features, at specific locations, timber-panelled doors with letterbox fanlights, framed by doorpieces consisting of engaged fluted Greek Doric columns supporting an entablature and pediment that breaks the first-floor cill course. Each pedimented doorway is flanked by groupings of three bays, featuring narrow windows with extended cills to the inner bays, timber-panelled doors with letterbox fanlights framed by Greek Doric pilasters with projecting entablatures to the central bays, and windows with recessed surrounds and aprons to the outer bays.

The western elevation (Hillside Street) incorporates a four-storey and basement canted bay on the far left, with tripartite windows featuring stop-chamfered mullions. A blind window is situated on the far right, excluding the ground floor. First-floor windows are corniced, and a returned modillioned cornice runs below the third-floor cill course on the far right.

Similarly, the eastern elevation (Wellington Street) includes a four-storey and basement canted bay on the far right, also featuring tripartite windows with stop-chamfered mullions. A blind window is present on the far left. Corniced first-floor windows and a returned modillioned cornice below the third-floor cill course are also incorporated.

The windows are timber sash and case with plate glass. The roofs are pitched, with a flat or near-flat section to the centre, covered with graded grey slates, stone skews and skewputts. There are nine ridge stacks on the Hillside Crescent elevation, two shouldered wallhead stacks and one gablehead stack on the Hillside Street elevation, two shouldered wallhead stacks (rendered to the right) and two ashlar ridge stacks on the Wellington Street elevation. The stacks are predominantly corniced ashlar, topped with octagonal cans.