The Pleasance

The Pleasance is a theatre, bar, sports and recreation complex in Edinburgh, Scotland, situated on a street of the same name. It is owned by the University of Edinburgh, and for nine months of the year it serves the Edinburgh University Students' Association as a societies centre, sports complex, student union bar and entertainment venue. Every August, it is converted into one of the main venues for the Edinburgh Festival Fringe. The Pleasance Theatre Trust operate the venue during this time, and in this guise the complex is sometimes referred to as Pleasance Edinburgh to distinguish it from a sister venue, also called The Pleasance, that the trust opened in Islington in London in 1995.

1. Facilities

The Pleasance complex consists of a number of separate buildings, with the main block situated around a central, cobbled courtyard. The main block houses two bars, The Pleasance Bar and The Cabaret Bar, situated in adjoining rooms with a removable partition in-between. Upstairs from these, also in the main block, is the main Pleasance Theatre. Unlike other university buildings, all these spaces are open to the public year round, without the need for student identification. The Cabaret Bar and Theatre host a programme of live events throughout the year, including the Pleasance Sessions music festival and regular live music, comedy, spoken word and poetry nights. It is also home to Edinburgh Folk Club. The rest of the complex contains rooms and meeting spaces which can be booked out for society use. In a building towards the rear of the plot is the Pleasance sports centre and gym.

1. = Edinburgh Festival Fringe =

Every August, the whole complex is converted into a variety of performance spaces under the aegis of The Pleasance Theatre Trust. The main theatre, capacity 299, and renamed Pleasance One for the duration of the Fringe, is one of these. The Cabaret Bar (capacity 170) is another. Other spaces range in size from the 750-seat Pleasance Grand (in the sports centre) to the 46-capacity Cellar. For the purposes of the Fringe brochure, all these spaces are collectively called Pleasance Courtyard, and listed as venue 33. As one of the “Big Four” venues, programming at the Pleasance is perceived to be of a high standard, featuring nationally-recognised acts, with a tendency towards comedy and cabaret. The courtyard becomes "the biggest beer garden in the city" for the month of August. Although 2024 marks the Pleasance Theatre Trust’s “40th Fringe programme”, the venue’s historic connection with the Edinburgh Festival Fringe goes right back to the beginning, with the venue hosting two of the eight productions which made up the inaugural Edinburgh Festival Fringe 1947.
During August, the Pleasance Theatre Trust also operates out of Potterrow, an entirely separate student union building closer to the University’s main Southside sites, and the Edinburgh International Conference Centre. To avoid confusion, these are branded as "Pleasance Dome" and “Pleasance at EICC” during the Fringe, and have distinct venue numbers 23 and 150 respectively.

1. References


1. External links

Official website Pleasance Trust website

Nearby Places View Menu

Pleasance (street)

The Pleasance is a street just outside the Old Town of Edinburgh, Scotland, located in the Southside area. A remnant of the Flodden Wall flanks the west side of the street between Drummond Street and the Cowgate. The University of Edinburgh owns a complex of buildings on the street known as The Pleasance which, for nine months of the year, operate as one of the four Student Union venues that serve the Edinburgh University Students' Association. In August, the complex is converted to use as one of the major venues of the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, for which it is most publicly well-known. The street runs in a predominantly north–south direction for about 600 m (1⁄3 mile), from the junction of Cowgate, St Mary's Street, and Holyrood Road to the junction with East Crosscauseway, where it becomes St Leonards Street. The first section rises quite steeply, from 190 to 250 feet (58 to 76 m), then is relatively flat south of East Adam Street Historically, the street was one of the main routes into Edinburgh from the south, meeting St Mary's Wynd (now St Mary's Street) at St Mary's Wynd Port, one of the gateways of the town walls. The name Pleasance derives from the Scots plesance, meaning a park or garden. It first appears in 1507 as the name of a nearby house, and was later transferred to the street and then the suburb which was part of the regality of the Canongate. The derivation of the name from a nunnery of St Mary of Placentia, often mentioned in histories of Edinburgh, is an invention by William Maitland in his 1753 History of Edinburgh.

Event Neighbourhood

Pleasance Church

Pleasance Church was a Presbyterian church on the Pleasance in the Southside of Edinburgh, Scotland. Originating in the Relief Church in the 1820s, the congregation united with Charteris Memorial in 1953. In 1842, the congregations of Arthur Street Relief Church (founded in 1825 and known as Brighton Street Relief Church between 1827 and 1835) and Roxburgh Terrace Relief Church (founded as Bethel Relief Church in 1824) united. As with the rest of the Relief Church, they joined the United Presbyterian Church in 1847, adopting the name Pleasance United Presbyterian Church. On union with the United Free Church in 1900, the congregation became Arthur Street United Free Church. Historically one of the Southside's smaller congregations, it was strengthened in 1919 by its union with Pleasance Mission Church and the attached New College Settlement, after which it adopted the name Pleasance United Free Church. The congregation, as with most of the United Free Church, joined the Church of Scotland in 1929, becoming Pleasance Parish Church. The settlement closed in 1952 and Pleasance united with the nearby Charteris Memorial Church the following year. The church's building was constructed for a congregation of Baptists in 1811. The Relief congregation occupied it from 1835 and the addition of galleries the following year increased its capacity from 700 to 1,000. In 1883, David Robertson recast the building in the Norman style. The building was demolished in 1982, having latterly been occupied as a store by Henry Willis & Sons.

Church

New College Settlement

The New College Settlement was a student settlement based on the Pleasance in the Southside of Edinburgh, Scotland. Founded by students of New College in 1893, its work continued until 1952. New College was the ministerial training college for the Free Church of Scotland. The New College Missionary Society had undertaken home mission work in deprived areas of Edinburgh since 1845, settling in the former buildings of Pleasance Free Church in 1876. In 1893, a tenement for resident student workers was added to the mission premises, establishing the mission as part of the growing settlement movement. Having previously relied on student wardens, a permanent, ordained warden, John Harry Miller, was appointed in 1908. In 1913, the settlement was constituted as Pleasance Mission Church. In 1919, this united with nearby Arthur Street United Free Church. Miller became minister of the united charge of Pleasance United Free Church, holding the role in tandem with the wardenship of the settlement. By the wake of the Second World War the Pleasance area was experiencing depopulation and the settlement closed in 1952. The settlement's buildings consisted of the former Pleasance Free Church and, next door, a tenement of 1891–1893 designed by Henry F. Kerr. The tenement is an example of both Arts and Crafts architecture and of the Old Edinburgh movement, popularised by Patrick Geddes. The buildings now form part of the University of Edinburgh's Pleasance complex.

Church Landmark

School of GeoSciences, University of Edinburgh

The University of Edinburgh School of GeoSciences is a department within the College of Science and Engineering at the University of Edinburgh in Scotland. It was formed in 2002 by the merger of four departments. It is split between the King's Buildings and the Central Area of the university. The institutes of Ecological Sciences and Earth Science are located at the King's Buildings, whilst the Institute of Geography is located on Drummond Street in the Central Area. In 2013 the department was ranked 8th best place to study geography in the country by The Guardian University Rankings, down from 2nd in 2006. The school is ranked as one of the best in the UK for Earth Sciences. A 2008 Research Assessment Exercise assessment ranked the "Earth Systems and Environmental Science" department as the best in the UK by number of world leading research and staff. Its Geography department was ranked 15th in the world according to the 2015 QS rankings. There are over 1100 undergraduate students and 250 postgraduate students in the School of GeoSciences. There are also around 100 research and teaching staff within the school. The School collaborates with the University of Edinburgh Business School and the School of Economics, to offer a Carbon Management MSc degree, the first in the world, which has students from over 20 countries. The school also has exchange programmes though the Erasmus programme, in addition to universities in Canada, the United States, Australia and New Zealand. The head of the School of GeoSciences is currently Professor Bryne Ngwenya. Famous recent alumni of the School include former BP chief executive Tony Hayward. Former Rector of the university Peter McColl matriculated at one of the predecessors, the Department of Geography. Competition for entry is highly selective, in 2010, the School received 2221 applications, but only 275 offers were made, representing a 16.9% of an applicant receiving an offer. The school currently offers 11 undergraduate courses and a range of postgraduate degrees.

School University