Tag Archives: Edinburgh

December 7, 2023

Special Little Places: Closes, Corridors and Courts

By daseger

Still basking in my Edinburgh afterglow as we finish the last week of classes of the Fall 2023 semester: at home, as a deficient boiler has rendered Salem State’s North Campus an uninhabitable place. Shades of 2020-2021 for sure! I’m actually teaching two online classes by choice next semester, but I was not expecting to be back on Zoom so soon. I had a bit of time to think about some themes I wanted to emphasize about my Scotland trip, and one is “special little places”: I find that in most (not all) European cities that I have visited there are urban spaces which preserve a bit of the past, off the beaten path. Little courtyards and lanes and ways. Off the Royal Mile in Edinburgh there are so many “closes”! It’s quite extraordinary really–some access other ways, some are closed-off, all seem to transport you off a busy street into somwhere else. Here are just a few: Riddell’ss Close AND Court, Advocate’s Close, Tweeddale Court and Bakehouse Close: the latter two arre Outlander locations, and I encountered an Outlander tour just after I took these pictures!

There are some special places in Edinburgh’s 18th century “New Town” as well, but not as many: it was laid out for breadth, perspective, and movement, just like an American city (well, at least the latter). There are places and lanes that give you a bit of that enclosure within the larger city feeling, like Circus Lane below, and the spectacularly picturesque Dean Village. You can still get away, or get back, in the New Town.

There are a few places in America where you can get this out-of-time experience. Beacon Hill in Boston is like that for me. Neighborhoods in Charleston, Alexandria, Annapolis, Newport and Nantucket. Salem used to have lots of little ways and squares, but it has always evolved, and most have disappeared. Everybody’s favorite little street is actually a court, Bott’s Court between Chestnut and Essex, and I can spot a really special little way on a 1916 map of Salem: (the) North Pole! I’m not sure where that place went, but it’s definitely no longer here.

6 Comments | tags: Architecture, Botts Court, Edinburgh, Historic Preservation, maps, Streets, travel | posted in Culture, Salem

November 30, 2023

A Scottish Photo Feast for St. Andrew’s Day

By daseger

I’m just returned from a long trip to Scotland, during which I took hundreds of photographs, and today marks the feast of the Scottish patron Saint Andrew, so that’s the post! I promise more substantive essays in the future, but I have re-entered at the busiest time of the semester and my Salem’s Centuries manuscript is due in just over a month, so these photos will have to suffice for now. We spent most of our time in Edinburgh, but also covered a wide swath of south central Scotland, including Glasgow, Oban and Fort William in the west, and St. Andrews in the east. I spent my junior year abroad at that city’s university, and while I’ve been back several times since, it’s always great to go back. I really explored Edinburgh on this trip, both Old Town and New and some adjoining neighborhoods, so it was hard to pick my favorite photos of the capital, but I think I’ll favor the light. All the cities and towns we visited were aglow with Christmas trim, and every other day the sun bathed the land-and street-scapes for several intermittent hours: with moody mornings and darkness descending at 4pm, the light is very precious.

In Edinburgh:

Interior shots are of two National Trust properties: Gladstone’s Land in the Old Town and the Georgian House in the new. Of course the modern embellished building is the relatively new Scottish Parliament, about which I learned a lot. Christmas markets and fairs in every available green space!

Glasgow:

Glasgow Cathedral and Council Chambers are quite something, as are the Hunterian Museum and Art Gallery at Glasgow University. Charles Rennie McIntosh immersion is possible.

Western Coast from Oban to Fort William and through the Highlands:

Fife villages on the East Coast, and St. Andrews:

So, lots more to write about, including whiskey, GIN, Jacobites, McIntosh, Princes Street, old and new architecture, the power of Outlander, closes, courts and corridors, and hedgehogs, but this postcard post will have to do for now: Happy Feast of St. Andrew day!