Architecture of Scotland in the Industrial Revolution includes all building in Scotland between the mid-eighteenth century and the end of the nineteenth century. During this period, the country underwent an economic and social transformation as a result of industrialisation, which was reflected in new architectural forms, techniques and scale of building. In the second half of the eighteenth century, Edinburgh was the focus of a classically inspired building boom that reflected the growing wealth and confidence of the capital. Housing often took the form of horizontally divided tenement flats. Some of the leading European architects during this period were Scottish, including Robert Adam and William Chambers.

While urban centres were rebuilt in local materials, including Aberdeen in granite and Glasgow in red sandstone, the homes of the rural poor remained basic, particularly in the Highlands. In the cities they were confined to the sprawl of suburban tenements like those of the Gorbals in Glasgow. One response to growing population was the creation of planned new towns, like those at Inverary and New Lanark. The nineteenth century also was the revival of the Scots Baronial style, pioneered at Walter Scott's Abbotsford House and confirmed in popularity by Queen Victoria's residence at Balmoral Castle. There was also a revival of Gothic styles in church architecture. Neo-classicism continued to be a major movement in the works of architects including William Henry Playfair and Alexander "Greek" Thomson. The later part of the century also saw some of the most important architectural products of new engineering, including the iconic Forth Bridge.

Late eighteenth century Neo-classicism

During the Industrial Revolution, Scotland became one of the commercial and industrial centres of the British Empire.T. A. Lee, Seekers of Truth: the Scottish Founders of Modern Public Accountancy (Bingley: Emerald Group, 2006), , pp. 23–4. From the mid-eighteenth century this growing wealth and confidence was reflected in a classically inspired building boom focused on Edinburgh's New Town. It was laid out according to a plan of rectangular blocks with open squares, drawn up by James Craig (1739–95) and built in strong Craigleith sandstone which could be precisely cut by masons.P. Wilson, "A modern material", in P. Wilson, ed., Building with Scottish Stone (Edinburgh: Arcamedia, 2005), , p. 5. Most residences were built as tenement flats, divided horizontally, with different occupants sharing a common staircase, in contrast to the houses used in contemporaneous building in England. The smallest might have only one room; the largest, several bedrooms and drawing rooms.R. W. Brunskill, Houses and Cottages of Britain (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2nd edn., 2000), , pp. 234–5. Common features of neo-classical building included columns, temple fronts, rounded arches, flanking wings and domes.M. Glendinning, R. MacInnes and A. MacKechnie, A History of Scottish Architecture: from the Renaissance to the Present Day (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2002), , p. 153.C. Strickland and A. Handy, The Annotated Arch: A Crash Course in the History of Architecture (Andrews McMeel, 2001), p. 100. This classicism, together with its reputation as a major centre of the Enlightenment, resulted in the city being nicknamed "The Athens of the North". The gridiron plan, building forms and the architectural detailing would be copied by many smaller towns, although rendered in locally quarried materials.I. Maxwell, A History of Scotland’s Masonry Construction in P. Wilson, ed., Building with Scottish Stone (Edinburgh: Arcamedia, 2005), , p. 27.

Despite this building boom, the centralisation of much of the government administration, including the king's works, in London, meant that a number of Scottish architects spent most of their careers in England, where they had a major impact on Georgian architecture.M. Glendinning, R. MacInnes and A. MacKechnie, A History of Scottish Architecture: from the Renaissance to the Present Day (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2002), , p. 73. Robert Adam (1728–92) emerged as leader of the first phase of the neo-classical revival in England and Scotland from around 1760 until his death.N. Pevsner, An Outline of European Architecture (London: Pelican, 2nd Edition, 1951), p. 237. He rejected the elaborate Palladian style that had dominated building as "ponderous" and "disgustful".M. Glendinning, R. MacInnes and A. MacKechnie, A History of Scottish Architecture: from the Renaissance to the Present Day (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2002), , p. 106. However, he continued their tradition of drawing inspiration directly from classical antiquity, influenced by his four-year stay in Europe, where he saw the excavations at Pompeii and Herculaneum, which for the first time allowed modern Europeans to see classical buildings first hand, rather than work from literary descriptions. Neo-classicism strived for greater simplicity, often more influenced by Greek rather than Roman models. Adam's major works in Edinburgh included the General Register House (1774–92), the University Building (1789) and Charlotte Square (1791).S. Bietoletti, Neoclassicism and Romanticism (Sterling, 2009), , p. 36. He also designed 36 country houses in Scotland. An interior designer as well as an architect, together with his brothers John (1721–92) and James (1732–94) developing the Adam style, he influenced the development of architecture, not just in Britain, but in Western Europe, North America and in Russia, where his patterns were taken by Scottish architect Charles Cameron (1745–1812).Adam Silver (HMSO/Victoria & Albert Museum, London, 1953), p. 1.

Adam's main rival was William Chambers (1723–96), another Scot, but born in Sweden.J. Harris and M. Snodin, Sir William Chambers Architect to George III (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1996), , p. 11. He did most of his work in London, with a small number of houses in Scotland. He was appointed architectural tutor to the Prince of Wales, later George III, and in 1766, with Robert Adam, as Architect to the King.D. Watkin, The Architect King: George III and the Culture of the Enlightenment (Royal Collection Publications, 2004), p. 15. More international in outlook than Adam, he combined Neo-classicism and Palladian conventions and his influence was mediated through his large number of pupils.P. Rogers, The Eighteenth Century (London: Taylor and Francis, 1978), , p. 217. The classical influence also reached church architecture. Scots-born architect James Gibbs (1682–1754) introduced a consciously antique style in his rebuilding of St Martin-in-the-Fields, London, with a massive, steepled portico and rectangular, side-aisled plan. Similar patterns in Scotland can be seen at St Andrew's in the Square, Glasgow (1737–59), designed by Allan Dreghorn (1706–64) and built by the master mason Mungo Nasmyth. Gibbs' own design for St. Nicholas West, Aberdeen (1752–55), had the same rectangular plan, with a nave-and-aisles, barrel-vaulted layout with superimposed pedimented front.M. Glendinning, R. MacInnes and A. MacKechnie, A History of Scottish Architecture: From the Renaissance to the Present Day (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1996), , p. 143.

Early nineteenth century Vernacular building

Vernacular architecture of this period continued to dependent on local materials and styles.C. McKean, "Improvement and modernisation in everyday Enlightenment Scotland", in E. A. Foyster and C. A. Whatley, ed., A History of Everyday Life in Scotland, 1600 to 1800 (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2010), , pp. 55–6. Often built by groups of friends and family, the homes of the rural poor were usually of very simple construction. Contemporaries noted that cottages in the Highlands and Islands tended to be cruder, with single rooms, slit windows and earthen floors, often shared by a large family. In contrast many Lowland cottages had distinct rooms and chambers, were clad with plaster or paint and even had glazed windows. In the early 1800s urban settings also included traditional thatched houses, beside the larger, stone and slate roofed town houses of merchants and urban gentry.

The Industrial Revolution transformed the scale of Scottish towns, making Glasgow the "second city of the Empire",J. F. MacKenzie, "The second city of the Empire: Glasgow – imperial municipality", in F. Driver and D. Gilbert, eds, Imperial Cities: Landscape, Display and Identity (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2003), , pp. 215–23. growing from a population of 77,385 in 1801 to 274,324 by 1841.A. Clark, The Struggle for the Breeches: Gender and the Making of the British Working Class (University of California Press, 1997), , p. 18. Between 1780 and 1830 three middle class "new towns" were laid out on grid-iron plans, similar to those in Edinburgh, to the south and west of the old town.A. Middleton, "Glasgow's East End", in D. V. Donnison and A. Middleton, Regenerating the Inner City: Glasgow's Experience (London: Routledge, 1987), , pp. 19–20. The other side of increasing wealth and planned architecture for the aristocracy and middle classes was the growth of urban sprawl. In Glasgow the growing workforce was left to the mercy of market forces as suburban tenements were thrown up, particularly to the east of the city, like those of the Gorbals to the south, where overcrowding, lack of sanitation and general poverty contributed to disease, crime, and very low life expediency.P. Fry, P. S. Fry and F. S. Fry, The History of Scotland (London: Routledge, 1990), , pp. 203–4.

Urban centres increasingly made use of locally mined stone. While Edinburgh made extensive use of yellow sandstone, the commercial centre and tenements of Glasgow were built in distinctive red sandstone. After a major fire in the largely wooden Aberdeen in the 1740s, the city fathers decreed that major buildings should be in the locally abundant granite. This began a new phase in large-scale quarrying and led to the "granite city" becoming the centre of a major industry, which supplied Scotland and England with faced stone, pavement slabs and pillars.G. Coyle, The Riches Beneath Our Feet: How Mining Shaped Britain (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010), .

New towns