51-55 Thistle Street, Edinburgh

51-55 Thistle Street is a tenement building dating from around 1775. It has three storeys, a basement, and an attic, featuring an irregular five-bay design with shops on the ground floor. The building is constructed of coursed rubble with ashlar dressings and is situated on a slope that descends to the north at the rear.

At the centre of the ground floor, there is a doorway leading to a common stair with internal steps. To the right, a three-bay shop has a rendered facade and a stone cornice, with enlarged windows and a deep-set door. On the left, there is a rendered bay with a pilastered doorpiece leading to a bar, which incorporates part of the ground floor of Nos 59 and 61 (refer to a separate listing for those). The roof features two piend-roofed tripartite dormers flanking a single dormer.

The rear elevation is five storeys high and has four bays, with parts of the basement and ground floor built out. The windows are timber sash and case with 12 panes, while the shops have plate glass. The building has ashlar coped skews, rebuilt stone stacks, and is covered with grey slates. The interior was not seen in 1995.