Piershill - Izeria

Piershill is a suburb of north east Edinburgh, Scotland, in the shadow of Arthur's Seat. It is mainly residential, with local amenities including a large supermarket and filling station, bank, public library, optician, pharmacy, several takeaway restaurants and specialist retailers along with public houses. Piershill existed as a distinct area in Restalrig before 1500 and is recorded in 1588 as Peirieshill. The name may derive from the French name Pierre or from the Scots persche relating to other willow names in the area. Piershill is adjoined by Mountcastle and Willowbrae to the south, Jock's Lodge and Meadowbank just to the west, Portobello to the east and Restalrig and Craigentinny to the north.

1. Buildings

The Piershill Square East/West/Portobello Road tenements, containing 342 dwellings, were built 1937-8 by the Edinburgh Corporation Council. They were designed by Ebenezer James MacRae (1881–1951), Edinburgh's City Architect and members of his architectural team, Malcolm Murchison, James Tweedie and Andrew Rollo. MacRae was City Architect for twenty years and his infill developments and reinterpretation of Scots vernacular architecture are an important part of Edinburgh's inter-war heritage. These tenements reflect MacRae's tours of Europe in their planning and layout. Many of the original multi-pane sash windows have been replaced with uPVC (without listed building consent) as the flats were sold under the right to buy. They were built on the site of Piershill Barracks, and re-used the stone facings from the old buildings. They are a reinterpretation of the traditional tenement, a housing type more usually associated with the Nineteenth century.

1. Transport

The East Coast Main Line between Edinburgh and London lies to the immediate north of the estate. Smokey Brae lies immediately west of Piershill, being the local name for the route to Restalrig which travels beneath the railway line. Immediately before the first bridge on the high wall to the right can be seen the remains of the original back gate to Piershill Barracks, now walled up but still with the legend BACK GATE visible on the wall; there is also a bricked up doorway to the left of the back gate. As well as the East Coast Main Line railway there is also a busy crossroads, the main A1 road trunk route between Edinburgh and London and the A1140 to Portobello. The area is well served by Lothian Buses.

1. Piershill Cemetery

The cemetery appears unexceptional but includes a number of curious military memorials, and 63 Commonwealth war graves. To the east there is a large section reserved for Jewish burials and to the north-west is Scotland's first and Edinburgh's only Pet Cemetery. Notable monuments include:

Multiple members of the Codona family, fairground entertainers Memorial to David Norman Duncan, engineer lost in the disastrous test run on the submarine Thetis on 1 June 1939 Samuel Evans (VC) (d.1901) Sigmund Neuberger, a famous illusionist known as The Great Lafayette, along with his dog Beauty George Wilson, a recipient of the Victoria Cross Several monuments to members of the Order of Free Gardeners Monument to ex-soldiers dying in the service of the Earl Haig Fund Monument to the Jewish soldiers of Edinburgh who lost their lives in the two world wars Monument to soldiers of the Highland Light Infantry Monument to soldiers of the Black Watch Monument to soldiers of the Royal Scots Greys Two Czechoslovak service personnel of World War II. Note these lie in the central Jewish section

1. Community Flat

Until 2016 Piershill Square West had a "Community Flat", run by the National Health Service (NHS). Staffed full-time by a coordinator, with additional staff from various agencies supporting the project on a weekly basis, the Community Flat was run in partnership between the City of Edinburgh Council and NHS Lothian. It offered services including a residents' group; a parent and toddler group; stop smoking services; state benefits advice; social groups; links to Working Towards Health; and links to Action for Jobs with Jobcentre Plus. The flat was predominantly for use by residents of the two squares in Piershill, Portobello Road and the top of Restalrig Road South, but from March 2007 was part of the greater Regeneration Outcome Agreement area of Restalrig, Lochend and Craigentinny. It has now been returned to the Council by the NHS and is in ordinary housing use.

1. See also

Edinburgh, Leith and Newhaven Railway Edinburgh Suburban and Southside Junction Railway

1. Notes


1. External links

Bartholomew's Chronological map of Edinburgh (1919)

Nearby Places View Menu

229 m

Jock's Lodge railway station

Jock's Lodge railway station served the area of Jock's Lodge, Edinburgh, Scotland from 1847 to 1848 on the Waverley Route and the East Coast Main Line.

Landmark Train

Jock's Lodge

Jock's Lodge is an area of Edinburgh, Scotland. It centres on the junction of London Road and Willowbrae Road (part of the A1 trunk route to London), Portobello Road and Restalrig Road South (Smokey Brae) and is an alternative name for the Meadowbank / Piershill area. Restalrig village lies to its north. The name is mentioned, as Jokis Ludge, in John Nicoll's diary in 1650. A sasine in 1736 refers to "the Bleugowns Lodge commonly called Jocks Lodge". It is recorded that the Bluegowns, the king's bedesmen, were called by themselves and others Jockies. Thus the name of their house was Jockies Lodge. The area is dominated by civil service office blocks, St Margaret's House and Meadowbank House, which were constructed in the early-1970s on the site of the St Margaret's railway locomotive depot, which was primarily for steam locomotives. From 2008, St Margaret's House has been leased to Edinburgh Palette, a registered charity which provides some 200 affordable studio spaces for designers, artists, small businesses and community organisations. Meadowbank Stadium, immediately to the west was the location for the 1970 and 1986 Commonwealth Games. The East Coast Main Line railway also passes by here. Many of the houses in this area are Victorian tenements. Both Royal HSFP and Lismore RFC were formerly based in the area; Lismore RFC taking its name from nearby Lismore Crescent. Jock's Lodge was the first stop and change of the team horses for the original horse-drawn stagecoach run on the Edinburgh to London journey. At the back of the Jock Lodge Inn were the stables. This journey began at the White Horse Close in the Canongate, technically then just outside Edinburgh.

Landmark Neighbourhood

Craigentinny Marbles

The Craigentinny Marbles is the mausoleum of William Henry Miller (1789–1848), a wealthy landowner and Member of Parliament for Newcastle-under-Lyme, who retired to his estate at Craigentinny after losing his parliamentary seat in 1841. Miller was childless, so upon his death in 1848, the execution of his will fell to a distant relative, Samuel Christy. The will contained instructions to bury Miller's body in a 20-foot-deep pit above which, The Scotsman reported, would be built a monument "in commemoration of the private virtues of the deceased, for, as a public character, he was unknown." £20,000 was allocated for construction. Although the monument would originally have been a solitary structure in a moorland half a mile east of Miller's house, it is now somewhat incongruously surrounded by 1930s bungalows on Craigentinny Crescent. The mausoleum itself was designed by David Rhind and completed in 1856, with two bas relief sculptures by Alfred Gatley depicting part of the biblical narrative of the Exodus added later. The relief on the north face, 'The Overthrow of Pharaoh in the Red Sea', shows the destruction of Ramesses II's army during the crossing of the Red Sea. The relief on the south face, 'The Song of Moses and Miriam', depicts the Israelites singing a song of celebration for their escape and the destruction of the Egyptian army. The 'Pharaoh' bas-relief was finished in time to be displayed at the 1862 International Exhibition in London, but the 'Song' bas-relief was completed just before Gatley's death from dysentery in 1863. The monument was designated a Category A listed building in 1970.

Cemetery Historic Site

Piershill railway station

Piershill railway station was a railway station in Edinburgh, Scotland, on a loop off the main line. It was opened on 22 March 1868. Piershill station closed in 1964, when passenger rail services were withdrawn from the Musselburgh branch rail service as part of the British Railways rationalisation programme known as the Beeching Axe, although the line itself was retained for rail freight use. The route was used for infrequent movement of waste from Powderhall to the East Coast Main Line until 2016. Piershill was near the temporary Meadowbank Stadium station which was opened during the Commonwealth Games in Edinburgh in 1986; Meadowbank station closed shortly after the games finished.

Train