1 Albany Street
In 1901 the shop at Number 1 was advertised to let at an annual rent of £35 and described as ‘commodious’.
1903 - 1918 Chemists
Run by Thomas Barron who, in 1909, also took over the chemist business of T. and W. Smith that had been established since the 1830s in Duke (Dublin) Street.
The premises then appear to have been split into two once more, housing various businesses.
1920 - 1950 George Cochran
Seed merchant, who died in 1950.
1924 - 1927 Nairn and Marshall
Drapers and Clothiers
1927 - 1929 Thomas G Hall
no information
1930 - 1960 John Bathgate
Electrical Engineer
No information has been traced for the 1960s and 70s.
1983 – The Magnum – pub and restaurant
The property was converted into The Magnum by Hamish Henderson in 1983. Henderson was born in Great King Street, and after schooling at Gordonstoun, studied art at Aberdeen and Edinburgh Art Colleges. He took up theatre design and worked at the Gateway Theatre in Leith Walk and then joined the Royal Lyceum Theatre Company in its first season. He later recalled: ‘Tom Fleming was setting everything up there and it was exciting in terms of the names we had performing there, among them Tom Conti, Brian Cox, Fulton Mackay, Russell Hunter, John Laurie, Duncan Macrae and Jean Kent. But we were into the Swinging Sixties and I remember thinking how awful it would be to wake up one morning at 50 and still be doing what I was doing then.’ So he left the theatre to become an innkeeper. After a brief period as an hotelier, among the pubs he developed were Nicky Tam’s in Victoria Street, The Baillie in Stockbridge and The Magnum. He then moved into property development.
When The Magnum opened, its stylish design came in for some criticism from the Glasgow Herald’s arts diarist: ‘The inn’s owner, Mr Hamish Henderson has tarted the place up and apparently hopes to build a clientele from Auld Reekie’s swarm of itinerant scribbles....In an attempt to bait the trap some of mine host Henderson’s bawbees were spent on a lavish decoration of The Magnum’s cornice…the works of Sydney Goodsir Smith were delved into and the required lines daubed on the plaster with suitable solemnity. Imagine our hero’s embarrassment, when it was pointed out to him that the poet’s name had been spelt, Sidney in error.’
Henderson responded: ‘Your arts diarist, Roderick Forsyth, refers somewhat out of context one would think to the Magnum, our new pub. While I have no wish to inhibit what appears to be a budding talent for the snide and inconsequential, I feel that he would do well to learn from Dorothy Parker that bitchyness is particularly mordant when tinged with accuracy!’
Henderson then corrects a number of inaccuracies, including pointing out that the spelling error had been: ‘noted and corrected weeks before unveiling to the public (I take it that in the Olympian fastnesses of the Herald office corrected proofs are unknown!)' Henderson went on to say that the quote from the poet –‘Freedom and whisky gang thegither, or sae the Bardie sang, whisky sweet or whisky neat, or whisky short or lang' – had been chosen. partly because of its aptness, and partly as Henderson had been friends with the poet. Smith, a New Zealander who settled in Edinburgh in 1928, significantly helped revive poetry in Scots through till his death in 1975, and when his widow died in 2004, it was The Magnum that appropriately hosted her wake. In 1993, Ric Fox (photo) became the owner. An Australian, with a passion for wine, he previously had been Managing Director of Cockburns Wine Merchants in Leith. Chris Graham took over The Magnum in 2008.