St James Quarter in Edinburgh 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿 Scotland

Growing up in Edinburgh I used to get a bus in and out of the centre going to school every weekday and would get on and off at Edinburgh bus station which was beside the iconic St James Center.

It was rather dated though and has recently been replaced with the originally named St James Quarter.

We were there in November, and had just planned on popping in and out as we had other things to do. However, the weather was flipping abysmal and we ending cancelling some of these plans and spending longer in the Quarter.

As I said the weather was attrocious and very wet, and so I am showing a picture from we left as with the lights it shows off the entrance in the best light!

As you can St James Quarter was officially opened on 29th September 2022 by HRH The Princess Royal (Princess Anne) which was just three weeks after her mum had passed away, but life goes on even if you are Royalty.

You can see at the entrance the shooting stars, and they were absolutely everywhere inside the development.

The development is situated close to both Edinburgh Waverley railway station and St Andrew Square & York Place tram stops, along with multiple bus stops close by.

Thank you wikipedia

It is right beside Princes St and you can see The Sir Walter Scott monument in the distance!

Just as in the old St James Centre shopping centre, the anchor tenant of St James Quarter is John Lewis the department store which is spread over 6 levels.

John Lewis really is a great shop, and you know you are getting a quality product, I do recommend shopping there if you are ever in Edinburgh. Their yarn department is fantastic!

Shooting stars everywhere! You can see some of the levels of the store and of course you can zip up and down whilst you are inside. There are also entrances off the street into St James Quarter via John Lewis. In fact they are the same entrances as they had in the days of St James Centre.

I remember as a kid stopping at all the window displays as often they were full of things I wanted! Oh yes they were fun too, so I am glad to see that the tradition lives on!

It was not just John Lewis that had cool window displays, can you recognise what shop whis was from?

If you look closely, then you can see the dimples of Lego, yes it The Official LEGO® Shop of Edinburgh.

As the World Cup football tournament was right around the corner they of course had to have a World Cup display!

Fun Disturbing Fact

As Mrs T and I were outside the store admiring Nessie and taking her picture with my Canon Photoshot camera a guy dressed in black comes up to me. He flashes a plastic ID card in my face and points to his phone
"Zis okay!"
points to my camera
"Zat not okay!"

What the fluff!

Here am I a native Edinburger being told not to photograph in my country by a non native English speaker.

Why can I photograph something with my phone but not my camera I asked? The guy did not know, just that he is told to say no photography with a camera!

Wtf I mean I know Nicola Sturgeon thinks she is a dictator but really in 2022 we have that attitude in Scotland! It is not like it is a Nuclear Submarine facility or something.

So we went searching and looking at signs to see if there is any mention of this Rule! I did point out to the guy that there will be many tourists who will be unaware of this. He just shrugged his shoulders walked off...

We did find this ...

Yeah that rule to me smells of 💩

Well all that hullabaloo made us hungry. Of course there are loads of places to eat.

We did eat something and that is the subject of a separate post because it was amazing and all I will say that if you have a Tortilla® Burritos & Tacos near you, then go and eat there!

Before we go on, I just need you to be starstruck as well, so here are some internal shots around the shopping centre or mall as some of you guys might call it!

There is always loads going on in various parts of the Quarter. When we were there, the displays from a recent photography competition were being exhibited.

What with eating and shopping we did spend quite some time there and as you can see we left at 5.52 pm which in Scotland in winter means it is pitch black outside!

Now to spread some Christmas Cheer if you can tell me what the building is that the clock is housed in, then Santa tengo may well drop something to you. Just comment below and the hint is in the street from the street photograph at the beginning of the post!