Pencil on paper, 1837
Alexander Archer (fl. 1830s)
RCAHMS: Alexander Archer Collection purchased in 1950
The reliable flow of the Water of Leith provided valuable water power for the early industries of Edinburgh. The scale and diversity of these expanded greatly in the eighteenth century as more processes were adapted to waterwheel-driven machinery.
Many of these industries congregated at what is now the Dean Village, and by the early nineteenth century the banks of the river were lined with a succession of mills. Later in the century, however, with the opening of larger modern mills downstream in Leith, those of Dean Village went into decline and eventually all closed.
Alexander Archer was a prolific topographic artist, recording many buildings and archaeological sites in southern and central Scotland in the 1830s and 1840s.