The Edinburgh Royal Infirmary, also known as the Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh is the oldest voluntary hospital in Scotland.

Also known, at first, as the Hospital for the Sick Poor, the Physicians' Hospital, or Little House, it was established at the head of Robertson's Close on August 6, 1729 with funds from the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh.

It received a Royal Charter in 1736, and in 1741 moved to a new William Adam-designed facility with 228 beds in High School Yards, near Infirmary Street. In 1832, a surgical hospital was added. The surgical hospital was rebuilt in 1853.

In 1879, the infirmary moved to a new location, then in the fresher air of the edge of the city. The site, on Lauriston Place, had been occupied by George Watson's Hospital (a school, known then as a hospital). The school moved a short distance away to the former Merchant Maiden Hospital (another school) in Archibald Place. The original school building, by the same William Adam as the earlier infirmary, was incorporated into the new David Bryce-designed infirmary buildings and the chapel remained in use for the entirety of the infirmary's occupation of the site.

The earlier Infirmary Street buildings were demolished in 1884, replaced with public swimming baths and a school. Part of the colonnade of the original building may still be seen in a monument outside the city's Dreghorn Barracks.

In the 1920s the hospital required to expand, and once again George Watson's College was asked to move. An arrangement was reached to acquire the school's site, with the school to remain there until new premises could be built elsewhere. By 1932 the school's new premises in Colinton Road were ready, and the old Archibald Place building was demolished to make way for the Simpson Memorial Pavilion, used primarily as a maternity wing.

In 1948, the infirmary was incorporated into the National Health Service (NHS). Over the years it has maintained close ties to the University of Edinburgh.

In August 1998 a contract was signed to build a new Royal Infirmary at Little France, a replacement hospital on a mostly green field site in the Little France area in the south-east of the city.

In May 2001, Lothian Health Trust sold the 20 acre Lauriston Place site for £30 million to Southside Capital Ltd., a consortium comprising Taylor Woodrow, Kilmartin Property Group, and the Bank of Scotland. It is to be redeveloped in the Quartermile housing, shopping, leisure and hotel development. Much of the David Bryce infirmary will remain visible, but some infirmary buildings have been demolished. After pressure from conservationists including the Cockburn Association, architects Simpson & Brown were commissioned to investigate the possibility of the William Adam building (the original George Watson's College) being taken down and re-erected at the school's Colinton Road campus, or possibly a new site elsewhere.

The Little France site has attracted some controversy in the local media, such as the Edinburgh Evening News, not least because the city's main accident and emergency facilities are some distance from the city centre, and also because the public transport links to the site have been criticised as inadequate. As of 2006, a new road is being built to increase access by bus.

External links

• Lothian University Hospitals NHS Trust
• Engraving of Lauriston Place buildings from the Edinburgh Photographic Society
• Development of the Quartermile project
• Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh

NHS hospitals | Hospitals in Scotland | Edinburgh | 1729 establishments