About Valentine City Centre Guesthouse in Edinburgh

The Valentine City Centre Guest House is within Edinburgh’s City Centre at the South-West corner of the Old Town. Renovated in Summer 2020 and situated on all four floors of an 1813 Georgian Town House, a significant building in Edinburgh's history being a prototype of the Edinburgh 'three-door flats' layout later used throughout the city. Such a historic building can have no lift of course, but if you book a room on one of the upper floors up the wide original stair case, then we will of course assist with luggage if you would like.

We operate in a modern and professional manner- a year-round guesthouse and NOT a family home simply renting out spare rooms. You will receive a key to the guesthouse and your room which gives you full access during your stay; there is no 'locking-up' time at night, and no period when you must vacate during the day between nights that you are staying. We currently served a full cooked breakfast to your room- this must be pre-ordered and is available between 7.45 and 9.15 - priced at £7 per person.

All our laundry is washed, dried and ironed in-house, so you will not fall asleep to any chemical smells on your bed-linen, and those who are allergic to industrial laundry chemicals can rest assured that the worst you should find on our laundry is a clothes-peg mark!!

ALWAYS A HAPPY FACE WHEN WE SEE YOU - GUARANTEED!

Check-in is normally from 1pm onwards, but in the case of early arrivals; luggage can of course be left with us in the event your room is not yet ready of course. Arrangements exist for late evening/night arrivals, but we don't ask you to pay for the costs of a 24 hour reception, so guests are expected to provide a estimated time of arrival (which can be updated at anytime), and to be able to contact us by mobile phone.

If you have not stayed with us before, we are situated at the beginning of Gilmore Place on the South West corner of the city centre, within walking distance of all city centre attractions.

To make a booking, you can call us on the number below, or use our Availability & Online Booking.

You can find out more about our rooms and facilities here.

Samuel owned a retail outlet at 100 Grassmarket and also owned the mansion house called Lochrin Lodge whose entrance was on the north side of Home* Street adjacent to the factory

*correctly pronounced 'Hume' if [presumably] the Street was named after the Scottish Philosopher David Hume - more on the 'o' versus 'u' below!).

David Hume 1711-1766

So Why 'VALENTINE' City Centre Guest House?

The Valentine is named after James Valentine, a very important figure in Edinburgh's tourism history. His Father John started a printing Business in Dundee in 1825. Ten years earlier he had a son, James, who went on to take over the Business, and expanded the company into the increasingly popular 'cartes de visite' and then the publishing of photographs. The company grew through his children and published for several decades around the 1900's many postcards of Edinburgh (and later the rest of Scotland and the UK) that are now an important archive of Victorian Edinburgh. A large collection of his work is on show in the Edinburgh Room of the Central Edinburgh Library on George IV Bridge. They now have a fantastic collection of on-line views of Edinburgh called the Capital Collection.

In 1861 James Valentine was one of seven founding members of the Edinburgh Photographic Society, a respected organisation which is still going strong today!

The Valentine Company went on to become a household name in the UK as a publisher of greetings cards. It lives on now as part of Hallmark cards, but the Dundee factory closed in 1994.