History

Ryrie’s is a little changed Edwardian public house which occupies a very prominent position at the junction of Haymarket, Dalry Road and Morrison Street in Edinburgh. It has Baronial details and a Scottish Renaissance style teak wooden pub frontage. The interior has attractive leaded and stained glass with lettering and a finely detailed carved gantry behind the bar.

Kirkwood's map of 1817 shows the earlier building on this site as the Haymarket Weigh House. In 1830 David Lawrie occupied this building, otherwise known as ‘The Hay Weights’ as an Innkeeper. A few years later Henry Cochrane is listed as a Spirit Dealer at the same address. In 1842 the Edinburgh Glasgow Railway is completed and terminated behind the building. It is shown on the 1st edition Ordnance Survey map as 'The Railway Inn' and occupied the whole of the current site.

Alexander Ryrie (Snr) was born in Edinburgh circa 1807, married Henrietta Reid and was father to ten children. He appears in an 1842 Street Directory as a Gardener based in Dalry Lane, alongside possibly his mother, Mrs Ryrie. In various documents he is listed as a Market Gardener, and by the 1861 census he is occupying 11 acres of land.

The next year, 1862, he took on the Railway Inn, and the older western part of the building is rebuilt. Sadly he died in 1865 leaving his wife as the licensee. Henrietta died two years later in 1867 and as her daughter Jane was 21, she obtained the license for the premises. Jane married in 1868 and in the 1871 census her sister Margaret is shown as the head of the family for what has now been renamed The Haymarket Inn. 

The main part of the building was rebuilt in 1868 with maps showing it as rectangular with a bay window in the east of the north elevation. It is possible that this remained a private house for the family until it’s remodelling in 1906. Alexander Ryrie (Jnr) was born in 1850 and by the 1881 census he is listed as the Head of the family and as Publican of The Haymarket Inn.

We have an undated photograph from what we believe to be this period, showing two gentlemen, one of which is likely to be Alex Ryrie. The other is possibly his brother Henry. Alexander remains the licensee of The Haymarket Inn until the end of 1905, when he dies. By this time he is has whisky in bond at Leith. Unfortunately he does not appear to have seen the building remodelled to what we now know as Ryrie’s.

In 1906 the two parts of the building were linked as private and public bars of one property and the ground floor and interior rebuilt. The client for the 1906 work was Messrs Ryrie & Company, whisky merchants.

The architect for the 1906 refit, Robert McFarlane Cameron, was responsible for a number of fine pub interiors in Edinburgh, including The Guildford Arms, also part of the D M Stewart Ltd group. His practice was medium sized and very varied and ranged from churches and schools at one end to public houses and premises for the licensed trade at the other. He served as a bailie and magistrate of the city and was considered to be 'a firm friend of the Trade' and as such secured a number of commissions for re-fitting pubs. These became examples of what is now known as People’s Palaces.

George Morrison, a director of the nearby New Edinburgh Brewery at Slateford, owned by Thomas & James Bernard Ltd, became tenant. His widow acquired the heritable interest in the property and then her executry sold the public house to the Brewery. In turn, Scottish Brewers Ltd acquired Thomas & James Bernard Ltd in 1960. In the 1980s the large Ryrie’s and W M Younger’s Ales signs were placed on the gable ends of the property.

Further minor interior alterations in 1992 improved access around the bar, but left the majority of the original bar unchanged. Ownership of the property passed between large national Pubcos before being purchased by the Edinburgh family run pub company D M Stewart Ltd, which owns and operates some of the cities finest Victorian and Edwardian pubs.

In 2022, 160 years after the Ryrie family first began operating from the building, it reopened after a thorough restoration was completed.