Lady Stair's Close

Exiting Lady Stair's Close onto Lawnmarket (the Royal Mile).

Lady Stair's Close (477 Lawnmarket) is a close (-ose pronounced to rhyme with "os" in "most") in the City of Edinburgh, Scotland, just off the Royal Mile, close to the entrance to Gladstone's Land. Most notably it contains the Scottish Writers' Museum.

History

Located in Edinburgh's Lawnmarket, Lady Stair's Close is the location of an 17th-century townhouse called Lady Stairs House built in 1622 for Sir William Gray of Pittendrum, an Edinburgh Baronet. It was originally called Lady Gray's House after the widow of the first proprietor. ^[1] It was then bought in 1719 by the widow of John Dalrymple (1648 - 1707) the first Earl of Stair, hence its present name.^[2]

The close contains the Makars' Court - inscribed stones to the great names of Scottish literature.

Writers' Museum

This building, belonging to the city of Edinburgh, contains memorabilia which celebrate the lives of three writers who all at one time lived in Edinburgh: Sir Walter Scott, Robert Louis Stevenson, and Robert Burns. Burns stayed in a house in Baxter's Close (since demolished) to the east of Lady Stair's Close during his first trip to Edinburgh in 1786.^[3]

Gallery

• 
  Scottish Writers' Museum at the Lady Stair's Close
• 
  Sir Walter Scott's stone slab at the Lady Stair's Close
• 
  Nan Shepherd's stone slab at the Lady Stair's Close

References

See also

• List of closes on the Royal Mile

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Lady Stair's Close.

Coordinates: 55°57′00″N 3°11′38″W / 55.95000°N 3.19389°W / 55.95000; -3.19389