Arts & Culture \ Edinburgh City of Literature; Speculative Proposal

Edinburgh City of Literature Trust is the charity behind
Edinburgh’s status as the world’s first UNESCO City of Literature.
The charity exists to connect people to Edinburgh’s literary story,
past and present, in a city where everyone can experience the joy
of reading, writing and creative connection. Twenty one years on
there are now sixty three cities of literature around the world with
Edinburgh at the very heart of the network.

A longstanding ambition of Edinburgh City of Literature Trust is to
create a home for the UNESCO designation and the work of the
Trust - a dynamic space with a year round events and exhibition
programme and a gathering place for writers and readers.
This speculative idea suggests a building around the already
existing monument to the great Scottish novelist Sir Walter Scott
in East Princes Street Gardens. With the construction of the
Scott monument in Edinburgh in 1844 the city had the highest
monument to a writer in the world, only eclipsed in 1958 by the
José Martí memorial in Havana. Edinburgh City Council charge
visitors to ascend the monument and halfway up there is a tiny
exhibition room with three panels about Scott, the building and
the building’s architect.

This speculative proposal envisages a building at the level of the lower
pathway on either side of the monument. To the left is a
bookshop, reception, a relocated lower entrance to the Scott
monument, a writer’s room and an events space. To the right
is an exhibition space and café. In between is a permanent
exhibition connecting the two halves and visible from outside. A
terrace is available for the café on the right and in the centre it
would be occupied by permanently located busts of Edinburgh
writers arranged so as to be in conversation with each other and
with the visitor.
Both the events and exhibition space would have glass roofs,
capable of being louvered or blacked out and from both internal
spaces the monument would be highly visible. And at night, the
light from these spaces would form a new setting for it.