Circular Record Hall, General Register Office, Princes Street, Edinburgh is a Grade B listed building in the City of Edinburgh local planning authority area, Scotland. First listed on 12 December 1974. Archive store.

Circular Record Hall, General Register Office, Princes Street, Edinburgh

WRENN ID
ghost-glass-alder
Grade
B
Local Planning Authority
City of Edinburgh
Constituency
Edinburgh North and Leith MP: Tracy Gilbert (Lab)
Country
Scotland
Date first listed
12 December 1974
Type
Archive store
Address
Circular Record Hall, General Register Office, Princes Street, Edinburgh, EH1 3YT
OS grid reference
NT 258 740
Coordinates
55.95414, -3.18953
Source
Historic Environment Scotland listing

Also on this page: flood risk · radon risk · weather exposure · detailed attributes ↓

Description

The Circular Record Hall at the General Register Office on Princes Street in Edinburgh was designed by Robert Matheson and built between 1869 and 1871. This circular classical archive store features a two-stage design with eight blind bays. The lower section is adorned with channelled pilasters, while the upper section has panelled pilasters and single panels in between. It is topped with a balustraded parapet. There is a single-storey segmentally arched link to the main building, which has channelled banded rustication. The structure is capped with a lead dome that includes an oculus and rests on a square plinth, with top-lighting at the corners.

Inside, the hall features cast-iron galleries.

Local climate

Circular Record Hall, General Register Office, Princes Street, Edinburgh sits in a wetter-than-average part of the UK, with an average of 970 mm of rain a year. This makes it wetter than 76% of listed buildings in the UK. Its exposure to wind-driven rain is greater than that of 53% of listed buildings.

It experiences an average of 43 freeze-thaw cycles a year, more than 81% of listed buildings. Of these, 25 follow at least 1 mm of rain in the preceding 48 hours. Average temperatures at this location have risen by 0.3°C per decade since 1991.

Averages for 1991–2020; temperature trend 1991–2025. Figures describe the wider area (a grid cell of roughly 10 km), not the individual site. Contains modified Copernicus Climate Change Service information 2026.

More on this building

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