Step into the 1700s

Old Edinburgh - Reborn

Welcome to Old Edinburgh Reborn, a groundbreaking project that allows you to travel back in time. We're creating virtual photographs to let you experience Edinburgh as it was in the Eighteenth Century.

At Old Edinburgh Reborn, we're developing a unique way of bringing history to life through virtual photography. The project combines cutting-edge CGI techniques with historic sources - maps, plans, prints and written records - to create photorealistic images of 1700s Edinburgh. We're using the magic of cinema 3D modelling to take virtual cameras back beyond the dawn of photography - allowing greater understanding of how the city appeared back then. Click on the categories below to explore different aspects of Edinburgh before the Act of Union. And check out the blog below to follow how the project develops.

Photo realistic recreation of old Scottish Parliament in session

Inspiration

Imagined photo of Exchequer building by old Scottish Parliament

How it's done

Imagined photo of Olde Edinburgh looking up misty vennel beside St Giles

Images

The Project is funded by a

Jean Guild Grant

awarded by

The Old Edinburgh Club

A close that's vanished

Now that we've re-created Parliament Square we can explore some of its surroundings. There's a really intriguing close beside St Giles... And in this blog we're going to see some dramatic reconstructions of it. A close is the Scottish name for a passageway between buildings, which sometimes widens out into a courtyard. The passage can also be called a vennel. The one we're interested in is a narrow gap (just right of centre above the Guard's head in the top picture) which sta

Robert Sproul-Cran

Sep 245 min read

Edinburgh's lost 1700s shopping centre

For the past few years I've been searching for the lost Scottish Parliament. Now I've stumbled across something shocking, because its...

Robert Sproul-Cran

Aug 2511 min read