The Living Memory Association, based at Ocean Terminal, has recently been given a Heritage Fund award, writes project worker Russell Clegg. We’re using it to start a new reminiscence project – ‘Away for the Messages’ – on shops and retail history in and around Edinburgh.
We are looking for folk to contribute their stories, lived experiences and indeed photos and shop-based ephemera to the project (we can scan these and include in our current exhibition).
Fly-post-free zone. No. 10 in an occasional photo series celebrating Spurtleshire's street-name signs.
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Lovely weather for a walk.
No. 9 in an occasional photo series celebrating Spurtleshire street-name signs.
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Recent work to restore the exterior basement stonework of 19 Hart Street has revealed traces of an old shop frontage.
On the Broughton Place elevation it reads, ‘CONFECTIONS—M.T. SCOTT—CIGARETTES’. Round the corner on Hart Street, we think we can decipher a palimpsest of ‘GROCERIES’ and ‘CONFECTIONER’.
To discover more about the place’s history, Spurtle embarked on a tumultuous rummage through censuses, statutory registers, valuation rolls, Post Office directories and local newspapers. Here’s what we found.
Dear Spurtle,
Very very upset at the closure of Narcissus. A great disaster personally as well as for the local (and greater) community. One of the retailers who brightened up Broughton St visually … plus added variety amongst the excess of food-related outlets.
Feel incredibly sad for the staff, particularly Dagmar who seems to have been there forever. I just hope the business can be rescued and re-incarnated. Narcissus was the best florist in Edinburgh, in my opinion.
I guess Spurtle will have to find a new accommodation address too … ?
Miss H.F. Goodson
Dear Miss Goodson,
We share your sense of loss. And, yes, we are arranging a new postal address on Broughton Street. Details in Issue 328 (May).
Editor
April sunshine. Spring in the step.
No. 8 in an occasional photo series celebrating Spurtleshire street-name signs.
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The idea that visiting a gallery can be a healing balm is manifested in Shipping Roots, by Keg de Souza. This is the current exhibition at Inverleith House, Royal Botanic Garden.
From the first moment you enter the building, your nostrils and lungs are filled with the deeply calming aroma of eucalyptus. Eucalyptus is widely used as a natural cold remedy, by decreasing mucus and expanding the bronchi and bronchioles of your lungs.
Saddened to hear Narcissus Flowers has shut permanently at short notice.
Shop ceased trading on Thursday 30 March.
Horrible shock for staff (informed the day before). Big loss for Broughton Street.
More on this story in Issue 328, published on 1 May.
Got a view? Tell us at spurtle@hotmail.co.uk or Twitter
This is a longer version (with new reactions afterwards) of the article which appeared in Issue 327.
Readers are doubtless familiar with the recent background of short-term lets (STLs) in Edinburgh – namely, that following the passing by the Scottish Government of a law enabling local authorities to designate 'Short-term let planning control areas', City of Edinburgh Council (CEC) immediately announced the establishment of such a control area, covering the whole local-authority area, which came into force on 5 September 2022.