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Canongate Tolbooth
Built in 1591, the picturesque Tolbooth served successively as a collection point for tolls (taxes), a council house, a courtroom and a jail. It now houses a fascinating museum, the People's Story, recording the life, work and pastimes of ordinary Edinburgh folk from the 18th century through to the present day.
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City Art Centre
The largest and most populist of Edinburgh's smaller galleries, the CAC is home to the city's collection of Scottish art, ranging from the 17th to the 20th century, including works by the Scottish Colourists, as well as many fine paintings, engravings and photographs showing views of Edinburgh at various stages of its history.
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Collective Gallery
The Collective is an artist-run gallery with regularly changing exhibitions by contemporary Scottish and international artists. It's a little more cutting edge than the city's larger galleries.
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Dean Gallery
An imposing neoclassical mansion topped with monumental towers, the Dean holds the Gallery of Modern Art's collection of Dada and surrealist art, including works by Dali, Giacometti and Picasso, and a large collection of sculpture and graphic art created by Edinburgh-born sculptor Sir Eduardo Paolozzi. A smaller version of Paolozzi's statue of Newton (which stands outside the British Library in London) is in the garden.
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Edinburgh Printmakers' Workshop & Gallery
Founded in 1967, this was the UK's first 'open-access' printmaking studio, providing studio space and equipment for professional artists and beginners alike. You can watch printmakers at work in the ground floor studio, while the first floor gallery hosts exhibitions of lithographs and screen prints by local artists.
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Fruitmarket Gallery
One of the city's most innovative galleries, the Fruitmarket showcases contemporary Scottish and international artists; it also has an excellent arts bookshop and café . There are around half a dozen exhibitions a year, ranging from paintings to installations to light-based artworks.
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Gladstone's Land
In 1617 Thomas Gledstanes, a 17th-century merchant - and ancestor of the 19th-century British prime minister William Gladstone - bought this tenement building, which gives a fascinating glimpse of the Old Town's past. The comfortable interior contains fine painted ceilings, walls and beams and some splendid furniture from the 17th and 18th centuries. The volunteer guides provide a wealth of anecdotes.
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Museum of Childhood
Known as 'the noisiest museum in the world' (it's often overrun with screaming kids), this place covers serious issues related to childhood - health, education, upbringing and so on. It also has an enormous collection of toys, games and books: everything from Victorian dolls to a video history of the 1960s Gerry Anderson TV puppet series, Thunderbirds .
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Museum Of Edinburgh
The labyrinth of oak-panelled rooms and creaky wooden floors that is Huntly House (built 1570) is home to a lot of less-than-riveting displays, but there are some gems worth seeking out - an original copy of the National Covenant signed in Greyfriars Kirkyard in 1638, an interesting exhibit on the history of the One O'Clock Gun, and the dog collar and feeding bowl that belonged to Greyfriars Bobby.
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Museum On The Mound
Housed in the Bank of Scotland's splendid Georgian HQ, this little museum is a treasure trove of gold coins, bullion chests, safes, banknotes, forgeries, cartoons and lots of fascinating old documents and photographs charting the history of Scotland's oldest bank.
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National Gallery Of Scotland
Scotland's premier collection of art is housed in this imposing neoclassical temple nestled beneath the Old Town skyline. Once a year, in January, the gallery exhibits its collection of Turner watercolours, bequeathed by Henry Vaughan in 1900.
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National Museum Of Scotland
Consisting of two buildings - the 19th-century Royal Museum and the late-20th-century Museum of Scotland - which have been cleverly joined together, the National Museum of Scotland covers culture, science, art and nature, from ancient fossils to Formula 1 racing cars. Audioguides are available in several languages, and volunteers give free 45-minute guided tours.
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National War Museum Of Scotland
Exhibits concentrate on individual stories of courage, determination and heartbreak rather than broad historical narratives, and include unusual items such as a varnished set of elephant's toenails and the story of Bob the Dog, regimental mascot of the 1st Battalion Scots Fusilier Guards, who chased cannonballs at the Battle of Inkerman and was awarded his own medal.
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Newhaven Heritage Museum
The former fish market on the eastern side of the harbour houses a small museum decked out with tableaux celebrating the lives of Newhaven fisherfolk and the origins of Newhaven as a naval dockyard. A 15-minute video illustrates the hard-working lifestyle that survived here until the 1950s, when overfishing put an end to the traditional source of income.
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Our Dynamic Earth
Billed as an interactive, multimedia journey through earth's history from the Big Bang to the present day, Dynamic Earth is hugely popular with kids of all ages. It's a slick extravaganza of hi-tech special effects cleverly designed to fire young minds with curiosity about all things geological and environmental. (But its true purpose, of course, is to disgorge you into a gift shop stacked with plastic dinosaurs and souvenir T-shirts.)
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Outlook Tower & Camera Obscura
The 'camera obscura' itself is a curious 19th-century device - something like a periscope, using lenses and mirrors to throw a live image of the city onto a large horizontal screen. The accompanying commentary is entertaining and the whole exercise has a quirky charm. The Outlook Tower offers great views over the city.
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Queen's Gallery
This stunning modern gallery, which occupies the shell of a former church and school, is a showcase for exhibitions of art from the Royal Collections. The exhibitions change every six months or so; for details of the latest, check the website.
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Royal Scottish Academy
The distinguished Greek Doric temple at the corner of The Mound and Princes St, designed by William Playfair and built between 1823 and 1836, houses a collection of paintings, sculptures and architectural drawings by academy members dating from 1831, and also hosts temporary exhibitions throughout the year - details are posted on the website.
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Scotch Whisky Heritage Centre
Johnnie Walker meets Walt Disney in this series of interactive exhibits telling the story of whisky from barley to bottle. The tour kicks off with a wee taste of the real thing (soft drinks for the under 18s), and involves a 'whisky barrel ride' (mildly embarrassing for anyone over 12) through 'smell-surround' tableaux depicting the history of Scotland's national drink, before finishing - surprise, surprise - in a shop full of whisky.
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Scottish National Gallery Of Modern Art
Housed in bright, modern exhibition rooms that belie the building's austere neoclassical facade, the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art concentrates on 20th-century art, with various European art movements represented by the likes of Matisse, Picasso, Kokoschka, Magritte, Miro, Mondrian and Giacometti. American and English artists are also represented, but most space is given to Scottish painters.
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Scottish National Portrait Gallery
The galleries in this Venetian Gothic palace depict Scottish history through portraits and sculptures of famous Scottish personalities, from Robert Burns and Bonnie Prince Charlie to Sean Connery and Billy Connolly. It also houses the National Photography Collection, which includes works by David Octavius Hill and Robert Adamson, the 19th-century Scottish pioneers of portrait photography.
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Stills Gallery
Scotland's top photographic gallery hosts changing exhibitions of the best of international contemporary photography. It also has darkrooms, studios and equipment for hire.
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Surgeons' Hall Museums
Surgeon's Hall houses a fascinating trio of museums. The History of Surgery Museum takes a look at surgery in Scotland from the blood-letting and amputating barbers of the 15th century to the body-snatching anatomists of the 19th. The Dental Museum displays a wince-inducing collection of extraction tools, while the Pathology Museum houses a gruesome but compelling 19th-century collection of diseased organs and tumours pickled in formaldehyde.
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Talbot Rice Gallery
This small art gallery has two exhibition spaces. The neoclassical Georgian Gallery, designed by William Playfair, houses a permanent collection of works by old masters, including Dutch landscapes by Van der Velde and Van der Meulen, and a striking bronze anatomical figure of a horse, created in Florence in 1598. The White Gallery is a more modern space used to exhibit the works of contemporary Scottish painters and sculptors.
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Writers' Museum
Lady Stair's House, built in 1622 and restored in grand Jacobean style, houses a fascinating museum dedicated to Robert Burns, Sir Walter Scott and Robert Louis Stevenson. In the basement is a tall mahogany cabinet built by none other than the notorious Deacon Brodie. It sat in Stevenson's bedroom when he was a child, and played a part in the author's inspiration for The Strange Tale of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde .
Showing 1-25 of 25 results
