Source: the venue’s website, checked on 02/11/2026.
In Edinburgh, the city’s first public baths, opened in 1885, house a tapestry studio. The looms stand on the floor of the old pool, under the cast-iron roof and the skylight, and visitors watch the weavers from the gallery that once ran round the pool.
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The Marquess of Bute founded the studio in 1912, with weavers from William Morris’s workshops. Facing demolition, Robert Morham’s baths were restored by the Dovecot Foundation, a charity, and the studio moved in in 2008. The Ladies Baths, in use until 1995, is now an event space. A team watches a tapestry grow thread by thread, several pairs of hands on the same loom.
The Dovecot from Above tour lasts 45 minutes: £240 for a group of up to 20, from the balcony, Monday to Friday from 12pm to 3pm and Saturday from 10am to 5pm. With a guided tour of the exhibition it lasts 90 minutes and costs £340. The Ladies Baths and a meeting room can be hired. Waverley station is a ten-minute walk away.
Photo credits : JoeDerrySetch (Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0) ; M J Richardson (Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 2.0) ; Magnus Hagdorn from UK (Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 2.0)
We design and lead a learning expedition that goes through this place. You can also design it yourself with Agent A\lex.
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