Victoria Street

This guide to Victoria Street in Edinburgh follows architect Thomas Hamilton, known for the city's cool neoclassical landmarks, as he took on an unlikely commission in 1829: a curving lane the city fathers wanted dressed in warm Old Flemish style instead. You'll hear how he built it between 1829 and 1834 along the old, dangerously steep West Bow route, and how the street's colorful shopfronts and raised walkway came to be beloved despite going against everything he believed in as a designer. It follows the street's renaming for a teenage queen and one long-running brush-maker's shop that traded here for over a century.