The New Town is a central part of Edinburgh, the capital city of Scotland. It was built in several stages from 1767 to about 1850 and still has many of its original neo-classical and Georgian-style buildings. The most famous street in the area is Princes Street, which faces Edinburgh Castle and the Old Town across a natural low area that was once the Nor Loch. The New Town Gardens were given special protection status in 2001. In 1995, the combined areas of the New Town, Old Town, and West End were recognized as a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
Proposal and planning
The idea of creating a New Town was first proposed in the late 1600s. At that time, the Duke of Albany and York, who later became King James VII and II, was a Royal Commissioner living at Holyrood Palace. He supported the idea of expanding the city’s area to the north and building a North Bridge. He also gave the city a grant to help with this plan.
It is possible that the New Town could have been built earlier if the Duke had stayed in Edinburgh longer. However, he left the city in 1682 and became king in 1685. He lost his throne in 1688.
The decision to build the New Town was made by the city leaders after overcrowding in the Old Town became a serious problem. Many wealthy people were leaving Edinburgh for London. During the Age of Enlightenment, Edinburgh was growing, and the old city’s design no longer met the needs of businesspeople and professionals. Lord Provost George Drummond helped expand the city’s boundaries to include the fields north of the Nor Loch, a polluted lake in a valley near the city. A plan to drain the Nor Loch began, but it was not finished until 1817. Pathways were built to connect the new area to the city, including the North Bridge in 1772 and the Earthen Mound, which started as a place to dump construction materials. The Mound, now known as the Mound, reached its current size in the 1830s.
As the New Town developed, wealthier middle and upper-class citizens moved from the crowded Old Town to the New Town, where they lived in large, elegant Georgian-style homes on wide streets. However, working-class and poorer residents remained in the Old Town.
The First New Town
In January 1766, a competition was held to create a modern layout for a new suburb. James Craig, who was 26 years old at the time, won the competition. He designed a simple grid pattern, with a main road running along a hilltop to connect two garden squares. Two other major roads were placed downhill, one to the north and one to the south, with two smaller streets between them. Several smaller streets near these roads were used for stables to support the large homes in the area. Three additional streets ran north to south to complete the grid.
James Craig’s original plan is no longer available, but it may be shown on a map created by John Laurie in 1766. This map displayed a diagonal layout with a central square that mirrored the design of the Union Flag, symbolizing civic pride during the Hanoverian era. Both Princes Street and Queen Street were shown as two-sided streets. A later version of the plan kept the same spirit, reflected in the names of the streets and public spaces.
The main street was named George Street after King George III. Queen Street was planned to the north, named after the king’s wife, and St. Giles Street to the south, named after the city’s patron saint. St. Andrew Square and St. George’s Square were chosen to represent the union of Scotland and England. This idea continued with Thistle Street, named after Scotland’s national emblem, and Rose Street, named after England’s emblem.
King George III rejected the name St. Giles Street because it was associated with a slum area and the patron saint of lepers. The street was renamed Princes Street after his eldest son, the Prince of Wales. St. George’s Square was later renamed Charlotte Square after the queen to avoid confusion with another square. Parts of Thistle Street were renamed Hill Street and Young Street, making it shorter than Rose Street. The three streets completing the grid—Castle, Frederick, and Hanover Streets—were named for the view of the castle, King George’s son Prince Frederick, and the House of Hanover.
James Craig’s plan faced challenges when construction began. The new area was initially unpopular, so a £20 reward was offered to the first builder. John Young accepted the reward and built Thistle Court, the oldest remaining buildings in the New Town, in 1767. He constructed a courtyard instead of a row of houses, but construction eventually continued.
Craig had planned for two large churches at the ends of George Street, but only one was built on Charlotte Square. At St. Andrew Square, the land was owned by Sir Lawrence Dundas, who built a mansion instead. This mansion, Dundas House, was completed in 1774 and is now the headquarters of the Royal Bank of Scotland. A monument to John Hope, 4th Earl of Hopetoun, now occupies the site where the church was meant to be. St. Andrew’s Church was eventually built on George Street. A monument to Henry Dundas in 1823 helped complete the visual design of the street.
By 1820, the first New Town was mostly completed, with Charlotte Square finished to a design by Robert Adam. This area was the only part of the New Town with a unified architectural style. Adam also designed St. George’s Church, but Robert Reid’s design was later used. The building, now called West Register House, now houses part of the National Archives of Scotland. Bute House, on the north side of Charlotte Square, was once the official residence of the Secretary of State for Scotland and is now the official residence of the First Minister of Scotland.
Some areas remained undeveloped at first. In 1885, an open garden on Queen Street became the site of the Scottish National Portrait Gallery. A dispute over land ownership delayed development near Charlotte Square, with parts of Glenfinlas Street not completed until 1990. The western end of Queen Street near Charlotte Square has never been developed.
The New Town was originally planned as a residential area with some professional offices. Few shops were planned at first, but commercial activity grew quickly. By the 19th century, most homes on Princes Street were replaced with larger commercial buildings. Some redevelopment continues today, though much of Queen Street, Thistle Street, and parts of George Street, Hanover, Frederick, and Castle Streets still have their original 18th-century buildings.
Many residents of the New Town were wealthy Scottish individuals, such as James Lindsay, 24th Earl of Crawford, and Henry Dundas, 1st Viscount Melville. These individuals were financially involved in slavery in the American colonies, either through trading enslaved people or owning plantations. Jamaican-born historian Sir Geoff Palmer noted that the New Town, often seen as a symbol of the Scottish Enlightenment, was partly funded by profits from the enslavement of Africans.
Northern, or Second, New Town and extensions
After 1800, the success of the first New Town inspired larger plans. The 'Northern New Town,' now called the Second New Town, was designed to expand Edinburgh from the north of Queen Street Gardens toward the Water of Leith, with added areas to the east and west. Most of these developments happened between 1800 and 1830. William Sibbald’s early plans followed the same grid layout as Craig’s First New Town, with entire streets built as single structures. Construction continued on an extended Hanover Street, later named Dundas Street, and beyond Great King Street, Pitt Street (renamed Dundas Street in the 1960s), nearly 1 km north toward the Water of Leith at Canonmills, where Bellevue Crescent marked the northern edge of the project. Streets were built on both sides of Great King Street, which was the central avenue ending at Drummond Place to the east and Royal Circus to the west. Northumberland Street and Cumberland Street were smaller streets to the south and north, respectively. Heriot Row and Abercromby Place, both one-sided streets at the southern edge of the development, had open views of Queen Street Gardens. George Winton was the builder for much of the Second New Town.
Large parts of the Second New Town, built in the early 1800s, remain unchanged. Townhouses typically lined the east-west streets, while blocks of flats (called tenements in Scotland) were built along the north-south streets. Shops were originally limited to the lower floors of the wider north-south streets. Larger homes had service mews—small buildings behind the houses—running parallel to their terraces.
The Picardy Place extension, including Broughton Street, Union Street, and East London Street, was completed by 1809. To the west of the original New Town, Shandwick Place—an extension of Princes Street—began in 1805. Development of Melville Street and the area north of Shandwick Place started in 1825. The Gayfield Estate (Gayfield Square) extension was planned in 1807, and by about 1813, the New Town gradually replaced the older village of Stockbridge. The painter Henry Raeburn purchased the Deanhough estate in the northwest of the New Town and began development in 1813, naming Ann Street after his wife.
In 1822, the Earl of Moray hired James Gillespie Graham to develop his Drumsheugh estate between Charlotte Square and the Water of Leith. This area became popular among Scottish nobles and wealthy lawyers. Most of the estate was finished by 1835, though some corner buildings were added later in the 1850s. The estate is now called the Moray Estate and remains one of Edinburgh’s wealthiest and most exclusive neighborhoods. Gillespie Graham continued expanding the New Town westward into the estate of Lord Alva, creating the West End Village.
Eastern, or Third, New Town
To help expand the New Town eastward, the Lord Provost, Sir John Marjoribanks, worked to build the Regent Bridge. It was finished in 1819. The bridge crossed a deep valley with narrow, inconvenient streets, making travel to Calton Hill from Princes Street easier and more pleasant.
Before the bridge was built, Edinburgh Town Council began planning the Eastern New Town. This area would extend from the slopes of Calton Hill northward to Leith, between Leith Walk and Easter Road. In 1811, the Lord Provost made agreements with landowners. Initial surveys were done, and a competition was held for architectural plans in January 1813. However, the results were unclear. Several well-known architects, including William Stark, James Gillespie, Robert Burn and his son William Burn, John Paterson, and Robert Reid, were later asked for their opinions.
William Stark’s ideas were especially important. He expanded them in a report titled "Report to the Lord Provost, Magistrates and Council of Edinburgh on the Plans for Laying out the Grounds for Buildings between Edinburgh and Leith." Stark died on October 9, 1813, and his report was published after his death in 1814.
The commissioners chose Stark’s student, William Henry Playfair, to lead the project. Playfair was appointed in February 1818 and created a plan in April 1819 that closely followed Stark’s recommendations. Playfair’s designs aimed to create a New Town even more impressive than Craig’s.
Regent Terrace, Carlton Terrace, and Royal Terrace on Calton Hill were built, along with Hillside Crescent and nearby streets. However, development further north toward Leith was never completed. On the southern side of Calton Hill, several monuments were built, including the Royal High School, designed in the Greek revival style by Thomas Hamilton.
Other additions
In the 1820s, some small projects began in Canonmills, but none were finished at that time. For many years, the tannery at Silvermills slowed progress in the nearby area. Starting in the 1830s, development moved more slowly, but after Thomas Telford completed Dean Bridge in 1831, the Dean Estate saw some new buildings. These included the Dean Orphanage (now called the Dean Gallery), Daniel Stewart's College, streets to the Northeast of Queensferry Street (built in the 1850s), Buckingham Terrace (built in 1860), and Learmonth Terrace (built in 1873).
During the 19th century, Edinburgh's second railway, the Edinburgh, Leith and Newhaven Railway, built a tunnel under the New Town to connect Scotland Street with Canal Street. Later, the tunnel was used to grow mushrooms and served as an air raid shelter during World War 2.
Principal losses
In the 1960s, a plan was made to build an elevated walkway on Princes Street. This plan included demolishing the entire street. The plan was not widely supported, but before it was stopped in 1982, seven buildings were removed. The old Boots building at 102 Princes Street, which had statues of William Wallace, Robert Burns, Sir Walter Scott, and Robert the Bruce, was demolished in 1965. Next, the North British & Mercantile Insurance Company building at number 64 was removed. The New Club, designed by William Burn and later expanded by David Bryce, and the Life Association of Scotland building, designed by David Rhind and Sir Charles Barry, were also demolished.
In the St James Square area, streets were demolished in the 1960s to build the St James Shopping Centre and offices for the Scottish Office. This area, which mostly had tenement buildings and had a population of 3,763, was largely destroyed because it was considered a slum. Only 61 of 1,100 homes were fit for living. Most of Jamaica Street at the west end of the Second New Town was also demolished for the same reason.
Bellevue House, designed by Robert Adam, was built in 1775 in what is now Drummond Place Gardens. Before the New Town extended to the area, Great King Street and London Street in the Northern or Second New Town were built next to this house. However, Bellevue House was demolished in the 1840s because of the construction of the Scotland Street railway tunnel below it.
Culture
The New Town is where the National Gallery of Scotland and the Royal Scottish Academy Building are located. Both buildings were designed by Playfair and are next to each other on The Mound. The Scottish National Portrait Gallery is found on Queen Street. Other important buildings in the area include the Assembly Rooms on George Street, the Balmoral Hotel (which was once called the North British Hotel, named after a railway company), with its famous clock tower above Waverley Station, and the Scott Monument.
The Cockburn Association (Edinburgh Civic Trust) works to protect the original look and design of the buildings in the New Town.
Shopping
The New Town includes Edinburgh's main shopping areas. Princes Street has many chain stores, including Jenners department store, which was once a well-known Edinburgh business. George Street, which was once the financial center, now has many modern bars located in former bank buildings. Multrees Walk on St. Andrew Square is home to Harvey Nichols and other designer shops. The St. James Centre, located at the east end of the New Town, was an indoor mall completed in 1970. Many people thought it was not liked because of its design. It included a large John Lewis store. The St. James Centre (without John Lewis) closed on October 16, 2016, and was later demolished. It was rebuilt and reopened in 2021 as the St James Quarter. Near Waverley Station is Waverley Market, which includes many high street stores such as Game, Costa, McDonald's, Sainsbury's, KFC, Subway, Superdry, and Greggs.