Moat And Boundary Walls, Including Landscaping, Scottish Widows Fund And Life Assurance Society Head Office, 15, 15B And 15C Dalkeith Road

Sir Basil Spence, Glover & Ferguson, 1972-76 (John Hardie Glover and John Legge, partners-in-charge charge; Norman Arthur, project architect; Dame Sylvia Crowe, landscape architect; structural engineers, Ove Arup & Partners). Office building in modern Expressionist style comprising series of interlocking hexagonal prisms varying in height from 1 to 4 storeys. Reinforced concrete construction. Series of recessed and projecting elevations and continuous curtain wall of brown solar glass in metal-frames. Pilotis partially support the block to SW with bridge access to principal (W) and rear entrances. The entrance, on W and to staff restaurant to E of steel-framed clear glass. Car parking spaces under pilotis on lower ground to the S and double height car park concealed beneath landscape terraces and sunken garden area to E. The basement service area to the N has metal shutters.

Double-skinned glazing, with brown solar glass to exterior and venetian blinds in the cavity (no longer operational). Mullions of manganese bronze, base courses of riven York stone, and pilotis of exposed concrete. Shallow pitched roofs covered in zinc.

INTERIOR: primarily open-plan office accommodation arranged around 2 hexagonal service cores containing lifts, stairs, lavatories and individual offices. In sub-basement plant, goods yard and double-height split-level staff restaurant, with building opening dedication incised within stone faced walling and feature ceiling of hexagonal prisms (obscurred by lowered ceiling). Basement accommodates car parking, storage, coffee lounge and kitchens. Front service core contains entrance hall and has revolving door of glass and steel. Separate stair with mirrored enclosure fomerly accessed first floor panelled board rom (relocated to third floor in 2014). Floors of entrance hall and lift halls are paved in stone and walls of staircase clad in riven York stone. Balustrades and handrails are of steel.

LANDSCAPING: extensive planting of trees, shrubs and lawns to N and S featuring decorative rocks and boulders. Sunken gardens and ascending terraces to E concealing car park building with rocks and plants.

MOAT: surrounding building to S and W. Lined with large pebbles, a feature repeated in the interior.

BOUNDARY WALL: battered, riven York stone boundary wall to W (Holyrood Park Roard) and S (Dalkeith Road) with triangular coping. N boundary contained by metal fence.