Publication Account
Date 1951
Event ID 1096174
Category Descriptive Accounts
Type Publication Account
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/1096174
225. 13 Waters' Close.
Mary, Queen of Scots, after landing at Leith on 19th August 1561 "remainit in Andro Lamb's hous be the space of ane hour," (1) and her resting-place is commonly identified as the house still extant at the corner of Water Street and Waters' Close. This building, however, has all the appearance of dating from the second decade of the 17th century. Certainly the finest of the historic houses in Leith, it contains four main storeys with a garret in the roof and is oblong on plan, with its major axis running roughly E. and W. The masonry is of harled rubble with exposed dressings, those of the original windows being either rounded or chamfered. Against the W. end of the building abuts an 18th-century mutual gable, while more modern buildings cover the E. end of the N. wall. Thus only the S. side and E. gable of the house stand free and unobscured (Fig. 428). Centred in the front or S. elevation is a stair-tower of slight projection, handsomely corbelled and effectively offset, which rises to a gablet, the re-entrant angle on the E. side of this containing a turret-stair for access to the garret. Attention may be drawn to the manner in which the W. side of the projection is taken in beneath corbelling to accommodate an angle window lighting the lower part of the stair, a device employed at a higher level on the E. gable for a similar purpose. Another feature of the same elevation is the broad crow-stepped chimney-stalk rising from the wall-head on the W. of the stair. A corresponding stalk on the opposite wall and a third on the E. of the stair are also original provisions, although partly rebuilt in the 18th century.
The lowest storey was devoted to store-rooms, entered from four wide doorways on the S. side and from a fifth in the E. gable. But there may also have been a workshop behind one of the storerooms since the flue of an original fireplace has recently been found in the back wall. All had wooden floors, with wide boards resting on joists which seem to have been bedded in sand. There are numerous cupboards in the walls. As far as can be ascertained there were two flats on each of the two floors immediately above, all four dwellings being entered off the common stair in front and each comprising hall, "chalmer" and kitchen. Whatever the arrangement, the rooms were spacious and fairly well lit; they had large fireplaces and some had wall-presses. Sanitation was probably provided by an outside privy, but there are two slop-sinks housed in recesses with ogival heads within the stair well, discharging into a common vent which emerges at the base of the wall of the stair. The W. flat on the second floor shows slight traces of painted decoration. On the third floor, where the main stair ends, there seem to have been two store-houses at the W. end-so much at least is suggested by a doorway in each of the side walls, to which goods might have been hoisted by block and tackle-but the remainder of the storey contained two habitable flats. The garret was no doubt divided into separate rooms, of which one still survives above the main staircase; these were probably intended for servants.
In the 18th century the property was extensively remodelled. Windows were enlarged, fireplaces were contracted, and the accommodation was almost certainly rearranged. The second floor, for instance, became a single flat of not less than five habitable apartments. Its principal room was panelled, and in the panelling was set a shelved niche of plaster with stucco enrichment in the head.
In 1938 the fabric was carefully restored.
RCAHMS 1951, visited c.1941
(1) Diurnal, p. 66.
