British Linen Bank Doorway, George St

This doorway caught my eye while my lunchtime walk.

The British Linen  was founded in Edinburgh in 1727 as the "The Company for Improving the Linen Manufactury in Scotland", but it didn't, due to the Jacobite Rebellion, gain a Royal Charter to enable it to gain limited liability to enable it to raise money until 1746. It then changed its name to the British Linen Company

However, the British Linen Company did not become a fully fledged bank until 1906. This was because the level of banking it provided was very limited, and there were objections from the Royal Bank of Scotland and the Commercial Bank of Scotland, it was not legally a bank. Even though the British Linen Company obtained a new charter eventually in 1813, it was still not allowed to call itself a bank.

The British Linen Company continued to grow slowly, and only when it was the third largest bank network in Scotland, in 1906, it gained permission to change its name to the British Linen Bank. Howver, it was only ever acommercial bank,not offering personal banking services




The British Linen Bank was incorporated in to the Bank of Scotland in 1969. The Bank of Scotland continued to use the name for merchant banking from 1977 to 1999

It makes you wonder with amalgamation of companies, how many company names will remain like this, permanently set in stone. This building is now a Fat Face.