The Moray House School of Education and Sport ('Moray House') is a school within the College of Arts, Humanities and Social Science at the University of Edinburgh. It is based in historic buildings on the Holyrood Campus, located between the Canongate and Holyrood Road.
The institution currently known as Moray House was originally opened as a normal school following the Disruption of 1843.[1] Known as The Free Church of Scotland’s Normal and Sessional School, it was originally located in Whitefield Chapel, and then in rooms below the Music Room in Rose Street. In 1848, the school moved to its current location in Moray House, in the Canongate.
In 1907, this institution merged with its Church of Scotland equivalent (the Church of Scotland Training College), and the Edinburgh Provincial Training Centre was formed; with the church training colleges subsumed within this organisation.[3] The new teaching building opened at Moray House in 1931.[4]
Moray House College of Education was officially formed in 1959.
In the early 1980s, Callendar Park College of Education, in Falkirk, was merged with Moray House.
In 1987, Moray House merged with the Dunfermline College of Physical Education based at Cramond,[5] and continued to exist on two separate campuses (Holyrood and Cramond) until 2001.[6] In 1991, the institute was linked with Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh; and was retitled Moray House Institute of Education. On 1 August 1998, Moray House Institute of Education merged with the University of Edinburgh becoming its Faculty of Education.
Following internal restructuring of the University of Edinburgh in 2002, Moray House became known as the Moray House School of Education.[7]
As of August 2019, Moray House School of Education has been renamed as Moray House School of Education and Sport.[8]
Structure
It is currently subdivided into four Institutes:
Institute for Education, Community and Society
Institute for Education, Teaching and Leadership
Institute for Sport, Physical Education and Health Sciences
During the nineteenth century, part of the original open area to the west of St John's Street and north of the South Back was occupied by breweries. These made use of the high-quality water from the springs and wells in this part of the Canongate.
In response to the shortage of teachers in Scotland in the late 1950s and early 1960s, Moray House looked to the possibility of building additional teaching facilities close to the existing estate at Holyrood. In 1961 Moray House purchased the property of the Aitchison Brewery. This included buildings at the ends of Playhouse and Old Playhouse Closes as well offices (no. 18 and 19 St John's Street), a tenement (no. 20) and Maltings. The price paid was £50,000.[10]
In the 1970s, three specialist teaching buildings were built from designs by architects Gordon and Dey.[11] They were St Leonard's Land (Physical Education), Chessel's Land (Visual Arts) and St Mary's Land (Science and Technical). The design of these buildings was representative of 1960s modernist architecture and somewhat out of sympathy with the surrounding areas of the Old Town. The bulk of the buildings were on land formerly occupied by the Edinburgh and Leith Brewery and before that by the Old Edinburgh Playhouse.
Chessel's Land
Chessel's Land was one of three buildings designed by architects Graham and Dey and constructed in the early 1970s; it opened in January 1974.[11] It was unused for a number of years and demolished in 2013 to make way for student accommodation.[12] Chessel's Land was designed as a specialist centre for the training of teachers in the Visual Arts, including painting, ceramics, textiles, sculpture, photography and jewellery. Inside the building were sixteen large studios and a large Exhibition Hall, which was available for both student and external use.
In the original plan for the site, the raised patio in front of Chessel's Land was planned to connect with a proposed Library and a Theatre fronting onto Holyrood Road. These buildings in turn were to be connected with the St Leonard's Land building on the opposite side Holyrood Road. In the event these plans were ruled out by the SED in 1978. The Theatre was never built and a new Library was eventually developed in Dalhousie Land.
Chessel's Land takes its name from Archibald Chessel, a successful wright to trade and stalwart member of the Tron Kirk who lived in the eighteenth century. He built the nearby Chessel's Court between 1745 and 1748. These were much-admired mansion flats built to accommodate persons of standing. They are still standing today and remain as private flats.
In 1993 Chessel's Land became the base for the Aesthetic Studies Department, when Drama studios were added. In 1996 Music was transferred from Old Moray House. With St Mary's Land, Chessel's Land was demolished in 2013 in preparation for construction of new student accommodation.
Charteris Land
Charteris Land
Charteris Land is home to Moray House's departments of Educational Studies and part of the department of Curriculum Research & Development.
In 1964, draft plans for a ten-storey teaching block were drawn up by the architects, Gordon & Dey, to be built adjacent to the west side of St John Street. However, the Royal Fine Art Commission raised an objection to the planned height of the building. Consequently, the building of the finally agreed six storeys wasn't started until December 1966. Subsequent delays arising from industrial disputes meant the facility wasn't handed over until February 1969.[10]
Following advice from the Edinburgh City Archivist this teaching block was named Charteris Land.
The front of Charteris Land boasts a sculptured wall (and a fourth panel), which were commissioned from David Miller, a member of staff at Moray House. The wall was cast in reinforced concrete into expanded polystyrene moulds. The sculpture was created in a continuous twenty-nine-hour operation by Arnott McLeod, Building Contractors.
The four panels all symbolise an aspect of educational theory:[10]
Panel 1 The Maze: Based on the use of the maze by psychologists such as Skinner and Tolman in experiments on rats to ascertain the power of deduction and memory retention in the learning process.
Panel 2 Growth and Development: How a form of life starts with a coincidence of two elements and whose eventual shape is determined by external influences.
Panel 3 Assimilation of Knowledge: Where differing units are selected and sorted in a rational way to form an organic retrieval system.
Panel 4 Community: With different forms fitting together symbolising the interdependence of man, woman and child.
Dalhousie Land
Dalhousie Land
Dalhousie Land is the library and ICT centre on Holyrood campus. It was again designed by the Edinburgh architects, Gordon & Dey, and was originally constructed in the early 1960s on the site of numbers 2 to 5 St John Street, and originally included a large lecture theatre, Art rooms and a swimming pool.
In the early 1990s, Dalhousie Land was refurbished to become the new library for the Holyrood campus. Previously, periodicals, learning resources and books had occupied various rooms over three floors in Paterson's Land. A grant was obtained in 1994 to enable the relocation of all library facilities to Dalhousie Land. The refurbishment plans involved the retention of the original concrete container of the swimming pool, which was redesigned to house the periodicals collection. The current ground floor is at the level of the original edge of the swimming pool, and now houses the main stock area and Service Desk. A new mezzanine area was inserted on the south side and housed the Children's Book collection. The top floor was opened out to house library and computer work stations. This new Library was opened in August 1996.[13]
In 1999/2000, a further refurbishment was undertaken to allow for the transfer of the stock from the Cramond campus library before its closure. This involved the creation of a new floor 3 out of the former lecture theatres on floor 2.
Old Kirk
The Old Kirk
This building (currently closed) was the kirk of the Old (or Great) Kirk, a congregation which had originally worshiped in part of St. Giles' Cathedral from 1560, and in this Old Kirk between 1882 and 1941. John Knox is claimed as the congregation's first minister (1560–1572). [14]
The building dates from 1881/2. The architects were Anderson and Browne. It stands on the site of the old drying green originally provided by the Earl of Wemyss to the residents of St John's Street in the 18th century.
In 1944 Moray House acquired the Old Kirk and its adjacent Hall. Following a major adaptation it became the base for the Music and Educational Handwork departments in 1949. A stage was constructed on the first floor using the timber from discarded desks. The City issued the Governors of Moray House in 1979 with a notice to demolish the Old Kirk's adjacent Hall, which had become dangerous. Until the merger with the University of Edinburgh in 1998 the building had latterly housed Moray House's Building Services. It closed and is currently a base for construction workers on adjacent sites.
Old Moray House from the Canongate
Old Moray House
Old Moray House
Old Moray House is an aristocratic mansion built after 1618. The building boasts massive obelisks flanking the gate and two very fine rooms up a turnpike stair, with elaborate original plaster ceilings and 18th Century panelling.[15]Mary Sutton, dowager Countess of Home was the builder.[15] Although it has been much altered by its occupants down the centuries, it remains one of the few original aristocratic houses built in the Canongate in the 16th and 17th centuries. Lady Home employed the master mason William Wallace (d. 1631).[16]
The west wing survives with two important interiors, the "Cromwell Room" which had originally had a balcony overlooking the garden, and the "Balcony Room", identified in Lady Home's inventory as "the new rowme that hes the balconie nixt the streit." Both rooms have ceilings of early 17th-century design. The Cromwell Room has an 18th-century decorative scheme involving neoclassical Roman scenes by Roderick Chalmers and James Norie. The decoration is believed to refer to the Jacobite cause.[17]
According to Lady Home's inventory there was a suite of vaulted rooms with access to the garden. She set out a garden with terraces, mount, walks and a wilderness, with two summerhouses. In February 1633, the Earl of Morton obtained her permission for the house to be used by Charles I during his visit to Scotland, but the plan was cancelled by the death of her son, the Earl of Home. In the 1650s the house was taken from her daughter Lady Moray for the use of Oliver Cromwell.[18]
The current Old Moray House, developed from a group of three buildings of different ages, originally grouped around a small courtyard. The earliest building was Mary, Countess of Home’s 1618 mansion. The Regent’s House to the east followed, probably before 1647. Finally the New House was built to the south in 1755.[15]
Old Nursery School on St John Street
Old Nursery School
The Old Nursery School building is currently the school reception. The building was converted to become the School Reception and Moray House College Archive in 1999 by Lewis and Hickey. As a listed building it was obliged to retain many of its original features.[19]
Moray House Nursery School was a purpose-built Nursery School designed on Montessori principles by Frank Wood in 1932. This child-centred approach required furniture, toilets, and even coat pegs to be designed specifically for small children.
Paterson's Land
Paterson's Land from Holyrood Road.
Paterson's Land contains teaching and tutorial rooms, as well as lecture theatres. For many years it hosted Chapters restaurant but this has now closed and been replaced by Levels cafe on Holyrood Road.[20]
Originally built as the New Training College (1911–14) off Holyrood Road by architect Alan K Robertson and designed to be a teacher-training centre for 800 students. In 1994/5 the building was renamed Paterson's Land in memory of Dr Maurice Paterson who was Rector of Moray House from 1864 -1907.[21]
Simon Laurie House
Simon Laurie House one of the original buildings, bordering the Canongate
St John's Land
St John's Land from St John Street.
The present St John's Land was erected sometime between 1766 and 1768 by John, the second Earl of Hopetoun. [22] It was part of his scheme which included the development of tenements along the eastern side of what is now St John Street. This was a prestigious development unusual in Edinburgh at that time consisting as it did of three or four storey tenements each with its own front door. Access to St John's Street from the Canongate was through a wide pend (1768).
By the early 1950s Moray House, through the National Committee for the Training of Teachers, owned St John's Land and the tenements along the east side of St John Street. Through the redevelopment of these sites the College was able made its own contribution to the Canongate renewal programme. The St John's Land project involved the redevelopment of the buildings at 176 - 184 Canongate and No. 1 St John's Street. The architect for the project was William Gordon Dey. Typical of restoration work at this time no attempt was made to preserve the Georgian interiors. Instead the entire building was gutted and only the existing facades and the south west turret stair were retained. The cost of the works was estimated at £41,000.[22]
The restored building contained studios for the teaching of Speech and Drama, staff studies and seminar rooms and a large proscenium theatre. For many years thereafter St John's Land housed in addition to Drama, the Scottish Centre for Education Overseas (SCEO) and, later, the Department for Social Science and Social Work. The Scottish Association for the Deaf used the basement as a resource and specialist equipment area. The Moray House Theatre was licensed for "public performances of plays and entertainment" and could seat an audience of up to 256.
Following the merger with the University the interior of the building was refurbished in 1998-99. The architects were Lewis and Hickey DJP. Facilities were created for the Department of Education & Society, including the Centre for Educational Sociology. These works involved the loss of the Moray House Theatre. The last student performance in the theatre, before it was cleared away, was Shakespeare's 'The Tempest'. This has the valedictory line "And now our Revels all are ended."
St Leonard's Land
St Leonard's Land
The current St Leonard's Land was opened in October 2001, and is the newest building on the Holyrood campus. It houses the Physical Education and Sports science departments, and has a swimming pool, laboratory and gymnasia. The PE department had originally been sited on a different campus at Cramond because it did not become part of Moray House until 1987, when Moray House merged with the Dunfermline College of Physical Education. However the relocation of the Physical Education department from its Cramond campus in July 2001 necessitated the expansion and refurbishment of the existing buildings.[6] The opportunity was taken not only to enlarge St Leonard's Land with a wrap-around academic addition to the north and east sides but to add a six-lane 25-metre research and teaching swimming pool. The architects for this project were FaulknerBrowns.
The original St Leonard's Land, now the core of the present building, was opened in 1971, and housed the original Moray House Physical Education department, which was a much smaller scale operation than before the merger with Dunfermline college.
The architects planned the original 1970s building to be unified by a concourse that spanned Holyrood Road, linking St Leonard's Land to a Library and Theatre. These in turn were supposed to connect via an elevated quadrangle with Chessel's Land and St Mary's Land. In the mid-seventies, these grandiose plans were shelved leaving St Leonard's Land somewhat isolated on the far side of a busy road.[23]
St Leonard's Land takes its name from the neighbourhood of St Leonard's which borders Holyrood Park.
St Mary's Land
St Mary's Land was very similar to its adjoining building, Chessels's Land. It housed the Environmental Studies department as well as scientific research. St Mary's Land was demolished in 2013 in preparation for construction of new student accommodation. The University Outreach Centre, Levels Cafe, and student accommodation now stand in its place.
Thomson's Land
Thomson's Land
Thomson's Land - contains teaching and tutorial rooms. Originally part of the on-site school which was known as Moray House Demonstration School. The school ran in two levels. The 'A' level was a semi-private school and the 'B' level was utilised as a part of the Teachers Training College enabling trainee teachers to gain classroom experience. The original Old Building contained the Headmaster's study, administration office and science classroom The main classroom areas were in Thomson's Land. St John's land housed the Janitor's accommodation.
The Royal Mile is a succession of streets forming the main thoroughfare of the Old Town of the city of Edinburgh in Scotland. The term was first used descriptively in W M Gilbert's Edinburgh in the Nineteenth Century (1901), "...with its Castle and Palace and the royal mile between", and was further popularised as the title of a guidebook by R T Skinner published in 1920, "The Royal Mile (Edinburgh) Castle to Holyrood(house)".
Cramond Village is a village and suburb in the north-west of Edinburgh, Scotland, at the mouth of the River Almond where it enters the Firth of Forth.
The Scottish Parliament Building is the home of the Scottish Parliament at Holyrood, within the UNESCO World Heritage Site in central Edinburgh. Construction of the building commenced in June 1999 and the Members of the Scottish Parliament (MSPs) held their first debate in the new building on 7 September 2004. The formal opening by Queen Elizabeth II took place on 9 October 2004. Enric Miralles, the Spanish architect who designed the building, died before its completion.
This article is a timeline of the history of Edinburgh, Scotland, up to the present day. It traces its rise from an early hill fort and later royal residence to the bustling city and capital of Scotland that it is today.
The Kirk of the Canongate, or Canongate Kirk, serves the Parish of Canongate in Edinburgh's Old Town, in Scotland. It is a congregation of the Church of Scotland. The parish includes the Palace of Holyroodhouse and the Scottish Parliament. It is also the parish church of Edinburgh Castle, even though the castle is detached from the rest of the parish. The wedding of Zara Phillips, the Queen's granddaughter, and former England rugby captain Mike Tindall took place at the church on 30 July 2011. The Queen sometimes attends services in the church when she visits Edinburgh.
The Canongate is a street and associated district in central Edinburgh, the capital city of Scotland. The street forms the main eastern length of the Royal Mile while the district is the main eastern section of Edinburgh's Old Town. It began when David I of Scotland, by the Great Charter of Holyrood Abbey c.1143, authorised the Abbey to found a burgh separate from Edinburgh between the Abbey and Edinburgh. The burgh of Canongate that developed was controlled by the Abbey until the Scottish Reformation when it came under secular control. In 1636 the adjacent city of Edinburgh bought the feudal superiority of the Canongate but it remained a semi-autonomous burgh under its own administration of bailies chosen by Edinburgh magistrates, until its formal incorporation into the city in 1856.
The Old Town is the name popularly given to the oldest part of Scotland's capital city of Edinburgh. The area has preserved much of its medieval street plan and many Reformation-era buildings. Together with the 18th/19th-century New Town, and West End, it forms part of a protected UNESCO World Heritage Site.
Liberton is a suburb of Edinburgh, the capital of Scotland. It is in the south of the city, south of The Inch, east of the Braid Hills, north of Gracemount and west of Moredun.
Pollock Halls of Residence is the largest halls of residence for the University of Edinburgh, located in St Leonard's, Edinburgh, Scotland, near the foot of Arthur's Seat. The complex of buildings houses more than 2,000 undergraduate students during term time, and is available to the public as bed and breakfast-style accommodation outside of the teaching term. While some of the buildings date from the 19th century, the majority of Pollock Halls dates from the 1960s and early 2000s. Pollock Halls are located on the edge of Holyrood Park, 1+1⁄4 miles (2.0 km) southeast of the centre of Edinburgh, and 3⁄4 mile (1.2 km) from the university's central area around George Square.
James Smith was a Scottish architect, who pioneered the Palladian style in Scotland. He was described by Colen Campbell, in his Vitruvius Britannicus (1715–1725), as "the most experienced architect of that kingdom".
DoCoMoMo Key Scottish Monuments is a list of 60 notable post-war buildings in Scotland, compiled in 1993 by the international architectural conservation organisation DoCoMoMo.
John Paterson was a Scottish architect who trained with Robert Adam (1728–1792) whom he assisted with his work on Edinburgh University Old College and Seton House Castle.
Ian Gordon Lindsay was a Scottish architect. He was most noted for his numerous restoration projects, sometimes of whole villages but curiously was also involved in the design of several hydro-electric power stations.
Dunfermline College of Physical Education, was a college for training teachers of physical education and hygiene in Scotland. The college was established in Dunfermline in 1905, moved to Aberdeen in 1950, and merged with Moray House College of Education, University of Edinburgh, in 1987.
Robert Philip Andrew Hurd was an influential conservation architect. His original aim was to be an architectural author specialising in traditional forms. He came to Scotland in 1930 and worked at the Edinburgh College of Art for two years as assistant to the architect and planner Frank Mears. He was an early and highly respected conservation architect and wrote and broadcast on Scottish architecture, planning and reconstruction.
John Douglas of Pinkerton was a Scottish architect who designed and reformed several country houses in the Scottish Lowlands. His work deserves to be noted for what the 2002 history of Scottish architecture remarks as an approach "of relentless surgery or concealment.". His most notable works are Killin and Ardeonaig Church, Stirlingshire (1744); Archerfield House, East Lothian (1745); Finlaystone House, Renfewshire (1746–47), Wardhouse (Gordonhall), Insch, Aberdeenshire (1757); and Campbeltown Town Hall, Argyll and Bute (1758–60). Several of these are listed buildings.
William Gordon Dey FRIBA (1911-1997) was a Scottish architect. He was a partner in the influential firm of Gordon & Dey which specialised in college buildings and had a long-running working relationship with Moray House School of Education.
The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to Edinburgh:
The Golfers Land is a site on the Royal Mile in Edinburgh, Scotland dating to around 1681. The site gets its name from the town house of John Paterson, said have been the teammate of the Duke of Albany in what is often regarded as the first international golf contest. The townhouse has since been demolished and replaced with a new building, but a plaque on the wall continues to mark the site of Golfers Land.
St Leonard's is a neighbourhood of south-central Edinburgh, Scotland, United Kingdom. Once notable as a centre of industry, it is now primarily residential.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.
