From the archives: Unique building in Edinburgh, 11 December, 1950
THE new warehouse of His Majesty’s Stationery Office, on the industrial estate at Sighthill, Edinburgh, which, so far as is known, is the first multi-storeyed building to be erected in Europe in pre-stressed concrete, was formally opened by Lord Morrison, Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Works.
The building, with three floors, has an area of 75,000 square feet, and its construction in pre-stressed concrete has, it is calculated, saved about 60 per cent of the steel required for a steel-framed structure of similar size. An assurance that the government will continue to place printing work for Scottish Departments so far as possible with Scottish printers was given by Mr Douglas Jay, MP, Financial Secretary to the Treasury. He explained that the Stationery Office had to meet many demands all over the country in its capacity as provider of government publications and of all sorts of supplies for departments.