81, 83, 85 Broughton Street, Edinburgh

This is a four-storey, basement-level, corner tenement building dating to around 1818, originally built as part of a terrace. In 1898-9, it was adapted as a public house by John Forrester. The building occupies a prominent corner, with a full-height, two-windowed bow fronting onto Broughton Street. At ground level, it contains a shop and public house, the latter featuring a particularly fine late Victorian interior.

The building is constructed from sandstone ashlar, with rusticated detailing in the regular bays at ground level. Architectural features include a base course, band courses between floors, a cill band at the first floor, corniced eaves, and a blocking course.

The west elevation, which faces the principal street, is classically detailed and includes a part-glazed, timber-framed public house front with entrances to the left and right. Above the public house front is a balustraded parapet topped with ball finials and a segmental-arched, pedimented tablet flanked by scrolls. An entrance to the upper flats is positioned to the right (although one door on the left has been blocked). To the left, at ground level, a projecting shopfront extends across two bays towards Broughton Place. The fenestration above is regular and symmetrical.

The north elevation, facing Broughton Place, features a projecting, timber-panelled shopfront spanning two bays to the right. This front has a deep entablature, a central segmental pediment, a balustraded rail with ball finials, and two-leaf, timber-panelled doors with ovoid fanlights. A wrought iron lifting mechanism for beer barrels is located to the right. Doors providing access to the public house front are situated in the remaining bays, and the upper floors have regularly spaced windows, with two bays at the first and third floors blinded to maintain visual symmetry.

The building originally featured timber sash and case windows with 12 panes on each sash, with four panes at ground level. Stacks are topped with terracotta cans and decorative cast-iron railings are present.

The interior of the public house displays a good, late 19th-century Classical decorative scheme. Lobbies have two-leaf, timber, half-glazed inner doors. The pub’s interior features a compartmented ceiling, decorative plaster cornices exhibiting egg and dart and foliate mouldings, and decorative consoles. The dado is tiled with panels depicting Scottish rural scenes, with polychrome embossed tiles at the upper edge, and plain tiles around the panels. Timber chimneypieces are fitted with tiled grates, and the over-mantles include mirrors. A ceiling-height, carved oak gantry includes a deep architrave, split pediments with ball finials, and a timber-panelled bar counter with pilasters and quasi-consoles.