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By the mid 17th
century, there were too many Edinburgh inhabitants to fit comfortably
into the Old Town. Buildings in the Royal Mile, within the city
walls, were high with poor sanitation, and the closes between them
were narrow.
Under Provost Drummond, a competition was held to design a ‘New
Town’. This would extend Edinburgh to the north by building
on the open farmland beyond the Nor’ Loch, about half a mile
to the north of the Old Town. The only road in this area was Lang
Dykes, with its dry stone walls.
James
Craig, then 22 years old, won this
competition in 1766. His plan was revised the following year and
building commenced in 1767. Craig’s plan proposed that a new
street, George Street (named after George III) should be built along
the ridge to the north of the Nor’ Loch.
Access to this land to the north
of the Nor' Loch had been difficult, but later the loch was later
drained in 1763 to create what is now Princes Street Gardens. Six
years later, the North Bridge opened, and in 1779 work began on
creating the Earthen Mound (now the Mound) to link the Old and New
towns of Edinburgh.
George Street was to be the grandest
and widest street in the New Town, 115 ft broad, linking two new
squares, St Andrew Square and St George Square. It was subsequently
decided that St George Square should be named Charlotte Square after
Queen Charlotte, wife of George III.
The other main streets in Craig’s
Plan were Queen Street and Princes Street flanking George Street
on the north and south, and Castle Street, Frederick Street and
Hanover Street forming a grid.
To encourage Old Town residents
to move to the New Town, a £20 prize was offered to the first
person to build their home in the New Town. This was won by George
Young who laid his foundation stone in George Street in 1867. His
house can now be seen in Thistle Court, to the north of George Street.
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In the late-1860s, as the building
work began, George Street would have resembled a straight country
road with fences on either site. It was to be another two or three
decades before all the houses in George Street were built.
Statues, including one to George IV who visited Edinburgh in 1822
were later added to the George Street junctions with Castle Street,
Frederick Street and Hanover Street.
The street layout around George Street today is still the same
as appeared in Craig's plan drawn up in the 1760s. More streets
have been built following further plans, created between 1802
and 1822, to extend the New Town further to the west, north and
east.
Initially, George Street was mainly residential. During the 19th
and 20th centuries, several banks and insurance companies created
new offices in the street, but in recent years most of these have
found new use as bars and night clubs, and a number of new up-market
shops have moved into the street.
Other prominent buildings built in George Street included The
George Hotel, The Royal Society of Edinburgh, St Andrew’s
& St George’s Church, The Assembly Rooms and The Freemasons’
Hall.
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SHOPS 
