Interior-general view of entrance to Banking Hall

Description Interior-general view of entrance to Banking Hall

Date c. 1890

Collection Records of Bedford Lemere and Company, photographers, London, England

Catalogue Number SC 700913

Category On-line Digital Images

Copy of BL 14435

Scope and Content Entrance to the Telling Hall, British Linen Company Bank, Nos 38-9 St Andrew Square, Edinburgh (now the Bank of Scotland) The head office of the British Linen Company Bank was designed in 1846 in the grandest possible style and on a colossal scale by the architect, David Bryce. The photographer, Harry Bedford Lemere, was commissioned to photograph the interior in 1896 on the 150th anniversary of the founding of the bank. The telling hall, lined with polished Peterhead granite Corinthian pilasters with capitals in bronzed zinc, has a geometrically patterned Minton tile floor that continues through from the outer stair-hall. The magnificent frieze, richly detailed with plaster swags, bears medallions showing many famous Scots. The busts on the frieze include those of the economist, Adam Smith; the novelist, Sir Walter Scott; the mathematician, John Napier; the engineer, James Watt; the painter, Sir David Wilkie; the humanist, George Buchanan; and Archibald, Duke of Argyll, the first governor of the bank (1746-61). Source: RCAHMS contribution to SCRAN.

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/collection/700913

File Format (TIF) Tagged Image File Format bitmap