The Söderberg bakery in the Meadows sits behind a facade of glass and dark steel, tucked into the modern development where the old Royal Infirmary once stood. The windows display rows of Swedish cinnamon buns and cardamom bread that smell…
Southside Bookshops and Cafes
This peaceful walk takes you through Edinburgh's bohemian student quarter, stopping at beloved independent bookshops and cozy, wooden cafes along the Meadows. It is the perfect way to spend a quiet afternoon hunting for rare paperbacks and vintage maps while enjoying the city's finest espresso.
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1. Söderberg The Meadows
2. Book Lovers Bookshop
A narrow storefront with a modest, painted wooden sign sits tucked away near the university buildings. This shop holds a dense collection of second hand titles that seem to grow in stacks from the floor itself. It carries a specific…
3. Tills Bookshop
Tills Bookshop occupies a narrow corner building with a distinctive, curved glass storefront that wraps around the street intersection. Inside, two floors of floor-to-ceiling shelves hold a dense collection of second-hand books, often…
4. Cult Coffee Roasters
The yellow door frame on this storefront stands out against the grey stone of the Southside. Inside, the shop occupies a space once used for basic storage by the university. When the owners took it over, they stripped back layers of…
5. Lighthouse - Edinburgh's Radical Bookshop
Lighthouse Bookshop displays a bright yellow storefront on West Nicolson Street, standing out against the surrounding gray stone tenements of Southside. This independent bookstore operates as a community hub dedicated to queer, feminist,…
6. Black Medicine Coffee Co
The black, industrial-style exterior of Black Medicine Coffee Co stands out against the pale stone of the surrounding tenements on the Pleasance. Inside, the walls are decorated with a collection of antique medical instruments and vintage…
7. Blackwell's Bookshop
Blackwell’s Bookshop on the Pleasance features a deep, cavernous interior filled with floor-to-ceiling wooden shelves that hold thousands of academic and secondhand volumes. Benjamin Henry Blackwell opened the original shop in Oxford in…
8. The Royal Mile Gallery
The Royal Mile Gallery features a distinct, narrow timber shopfront that juts slightly into the sidewalk along the Canongate. This building sits on a site where seventeenth-century tenements once housed weavers and merchants working in the…