Robert Adam Edinburgh Bridewell - Classical Scheme 1

Fig 1. Viaduct over the Low Calton - pen and wash - 1791 Robert Adam.

The drawing above, dated 1791 and held at the Sir John Soane's Museum, is for a bridge in the form of a Roman viaduct lined at its upper level with classical buildings, intended to link the end of Princes Street to Calton Hill and to provide a formal entry into the New Town of Edinburgh from the main road from the South. The main road to Leith, the Low or Lower Calton, would have passed through the "Triumphal arch" of the bridge below and the bridge would therefore have had a second function of providing a formal entry to the Old Town of Edinburgh from this direction.

We know that Adam did not conceive the idea of a bridge for this location. His Clerk of Works in Edinburgh, John Patterson, who supervised the construction of Edinburgh University (Old College), was instrumental in alerting him to the possibility of the commission for this bridge and for the new Bridewell. He also actively promoted Adam to the authorities as the best architect for the work.

Irrespective of this drawing's intrinsic value to us now as a beautiful, free, late "visionary" sketch by Robert Adam, it is interesting for several other reasons. While the main subject of the drawing is clearly the bridge, the drawing also seems to be as much about exploring the context the bridge would occupy.

Fig 2. Detail:-Junction of Princes St, North Bridge & Viaduct. University in the backgound, with the end of the North Bridge marked by a pair of lions on plinths on either side. Register House, opposite the end of the North Bridge, was built at this time, but from this view point would have obscured this junction had it been included on the sketch.

It includes landmark buildings in Edinburgh that Adam clearly felt were relevant to the exercise. In the background is his Edinburgh University building, complete with its dome (at that time not built). On the right is the junction of the North Bridge with Princes Street. General Register House (which had been built by this time opposite and on the axis of North Bridge) has been left off the drawing, because from this viewpoint it would have obscured the vital junction of North Bridge, the new viaduct and Princes Street. Also missing is Adam's later design for Leith Street, that would have run down to join the Low Calton to the North.

Fig 3. Detail-early sketch idea for the Bridewell.

The cloistered courtyards and the bow front of the building to the south are ideas that recurr in all the subsequent worked-up designs for the proposed newBridewell project.

For the purpose of these essays the drawing is interesting because it also may well include a first perspective sketch for the Bridewell. (Fig. 3) At first glance this looks like a crude early scribble, dealing with first ideas for a general disposition of accommodation around courtyards and with general massing. The clock tower with a weather vane seem totally out of scale. This may indeed be a first sketch, but it should be pointed out that the layout in fact quite closely corresponds to an accurately drawn plan also held at the Sir John Soane's museum. (Fig 4.)

Given the perfunctory way that the perspective is executed and that the main subject of the drawing is clearly the bridge, this rough sketch of the Bridewell may have been added as a mnemonic, a reminder of it being one element in an overall composition. It may also be first thoughts for a design omposition for the more worked up plan in Fig.4.

Fig 4. Plan - Early plan for the Bridewell.
This plan arrangement relates very closely to the sketch above.

There may well have been detailed elevations that related to this plan, which are now lost.

Assumptions can reasonably be made about some of the architectural issues relating to context that Adam was thinking of. How might Princes Street be terminated to the East? If a bridge were to be built then what form might it take and could it be designed to provide a formal, monumental entry to the New Town and Princes Street (and also from Leith)? Especially, if a new building (or buildings) were required to be built on Calton hill, how could these be best linked stylistically to the New Town and the rest of the city? The concern would have been to achieve a architectural coherence, particularly with his own existing built designs.

To follow how the design develops it is worth looking carefully at this. In this early proposal the entrance to the building is on the north side (bottom edge). From the entrance a lobby gives access to an (apparently) unroofed walkway leading to an open courtyard in front of the chapel (titled "Chapel Courtyard" on the plan) from which access to the other courtyards containing the cells can be gained. From the perspective it would appear that a large clock/ bell tower was envisaged over the chapel. There are six courtyards with cells, as well as two side blocks to the East and West. Of the latter, one is an infirmary, the other a bedlam (lunatic asylum). The courtyards with cells are labeled clockwise from the South East (top left) semicircular courtyard:-

Court with Cells for Felons
Court with Cells for Vilons
Court with Cells for Debtors
Court with Wards &c for the Sick
Court with Cells for Idle Women
Court with Cells for Idle Youth
Court with Cells for Debtors (another)
Court with Cells for Bedlamites

The next design for the Bridewell, worked up in a more detail, uses elements of this design such as the general massing, the curved geometry of part of the perimeter block and the symmetry.

Before going on to this next essay, there is another perspective sketch for a building on a cliff top in the drawing. (Fig 5) This is a curious temple in-the-round sitting on a circular base connecting to wing walls which are battered and pierced at regular intervals by what look like gun embrasures. The walls form what appears to a triangular enclosure on a craggy outcrop. The walls are terminated by rectangular pavilions oriented with their gable ends in line with the plinth, with centralised door(?) openings at "battlement" level.

Fig 5 Detail from Fig 1. showing a temple-like structure circular in plan and sitting on a circular base which stands proud of and forms the junction of wing walls, together forming an apparently triangular enclosure.

This could simply be a creative sketch idea for a structure that would sit well on one of the crags of this eminently sublime and picturesque site. It may be a sketch for an alternative design for the observatory that was started in 1776 to designs by James Craig but not complete until 1792 and which "upon the suggestion of Adam the famous architect, in consequence of the high and abrupt nature of the site, the whole edifice was constructed to have the aspect of a fortification".

Despite the classical designs for the viaduct / bridge and the Bridewell, Adam was thinking of fortified structures for Calton Hill from a much earlier date.