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Sir Basil Spence
Event ID 567345
Category Descriptive Accounts
Type Sir Basil Spence
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/567345
Building Notes
In 1933 Kininmonth & Spence were commissioned to design a detached house for Janet and Anna Reid, two sisters, at Easter Belmont Road in Edinburgh. The house was completed by the spring of 1934. It was one of several suburban houses that the practice built in the 1930s that show a fusion of Arts and Crafts Movement principles with the more modern ideas of the International Style.
Kininmonth & Spence had already designed the Lismhor house for Dr King at 11 Easter Belmont Road and both houses, like the others on the street, were painted white. Both residences had L-shaped plans, bow-fronted living room windows, and terraces on their roofs. However, the Reid House had its own hipped roof covered in distinctive blue-black tiles which were also used for the arched entrance.
Archive Details and Summary
The Sir Basil Spence Archive holds one framed colour perspective drawing of the Reid House. RCAHMS also holds one drawing dated March 1933. This shows a larger house with a central courtyard reached by French windows from the hall and dining room. It is thought that this scheme was abandoned because it would have proved too expensive.
This text was written as one of the outputs of the Sir Basil Spence Archive Project, supported by the Heritage Lottery Fund, 2005-08.
