Greenside Parish Church, Royal Terrace, Edinburgh

Greenside Parish Church, Royal Terrace, Edinburgh

A Grade A listed building comprising a T-plan gothic church designed by James Gillespie Graham between 1837 and 1839, with the tower added in 1851 and flanking gallery stair halls designed by David Robertson in 1885. The church officer's cottage, also by William Constable, dates to 1893.

The church is constructed in coursed polished ashlar, with stugged ashlar to the transepts and south elevation, and some rubble to the basement. A dividing band runs between basement and ground floor, with an eaves cornice and parapet. Cross-finialled gables feature throughout.

The principal north elevation is dominated by a three-stage square-plan entrance tower with set-back buttresses and string courses dividing the stages. The tower displays a single window at the second stage and tripartite louvred openings to the belfry, topped by a machicollated and crenellated parapet with tall corner pinnacles. Stone steps lead up to a studded gothic timber-panelled and glazed door at the tower base, set in a hoodmoulded surround with paired colonnettes and archivolts. Above is a raking finialled stringcourse, flanked left and right by single lancets. Flanking the tower on both sides are gallery stair halls with smaller doors, each flanked by single lancets and topped by sexfoil roundels within nep gables. Windows throughout feature hoodmoulded, recessed lancet lights in chamfered surrounds.

The east elevation features an advanced transept gable to the left with a triple lancet window and trefoil roundel above. A recessed section to the centre contains two ground-floor windows, with a blocked arched-surround opening to the basement. The stair hall gable to the left has a single window with extended cill course and two windows below. A flat-topped bipartite window of paired lancet lights opens to the basement.

The south elevation is dominated by a slightly advanced chancel gable at the centre, containing a triple lancet window and trefoil roundel above. Two basement windows flank outer trabeated doorways left and right. Transepts to left and right contain central single windows, with flat-topped three-lancet-light windows to the basement.

The west elevation mirrors the east in arrangement, with a stair hall gable to the left and an advanced transept gable to the right. A Tudor-arched doorway opens to the basement, flanked left by a bipartite window and right by a single window.

The pitched roof is finished in graded grey slates.

Stained glass windows are a notable feature. The triple window to the chancel depicts the Life of Christ, erected in 1886 with a First World War memorial inserted later. The triple window to the east transept depicts Saint John (centre), the Good Shepherd (1928), and Saint Ninian. The triple window to the west transept depicts Saint Matthew, Saint Mark, and Saint Luke. Single windows to the transepts feature geometric designs. Remaining windows are predominantly glazed with diamond quarries.

Interior

Entering at the main north door, a modern glazed screen forms a vestibule. Opposite is a high-relief tablet by John Hutchinson, dated 1871, commemorating Dr William Glover. Passageways to left and right lead to quarter-turn scale-and-platt gallery stairs. An arcaded gallery, supported by cast iron pillars, features a carved gothic wooden parapet, with the organ positioned to the rear. Plain wooden pews occupy the nave and transepts. A dais extends from a very shallow chancel, with gothic panelling behind and matching pulpit, chairs, lectern, communion table and organ console. Plain painted walls are topped by a cavetto ceiling cornice, with a cusped gothic ceiling rose at the centre.

The basement contains several small ancillary rooms and a hall. The hall features a raised stage at the east end with a retiring room beyond. To the ceiling, consoled beams intersect to form corniced caissons.

Boundary Features

Random rubble retaining walls with saddleback coping define the east, southeast, south and west boundaries. At the west end, a round tapered pier of squared rubble terminates the wall. At the southwest corner stands a pair of pink ashlar gatepiers with pyramidal coping stones. To the north and northeast boundary, an ashlar dwarf wall is surmounted by ornate spearhead-finialled cast iron railings, with three matching gates to the north and flanking wrought iron lamp standards. Along the north boundary, circular-design railings with spearhead finals are partly original.

Church Officer's Cottage

The single-storey and attic L-plan cottage, designed by William Constable in 1893, is asymmetrically composed with barge-boarded swept roof, broad bracketed eaves, and king-posts to gables and dormers. Constructed in red brick laid in English bond with red sandstone dressings (grey rubble to basement), it features a painted grey band course between ground floor and basement. Long and short quoins frame tabbed openings.

The principal south elevation displays an advanced piend-roofed bay to the left with a dormer at the roof apex, and a recessed two-bay section to the right with stone steps leading to a modern door with letterbox fanlight. A dormer sits above. The rear north elevation contains a single dormer-headed window breaking the eaves at the centre.

Windows are six-pane timber sash-and-case with glazing bars. The roof is finished in graded grey slate with terracotta ridge tiles and finials to dormerheads. Corniced, rendered chimney stacks terminate with circular cans.