ABOUT THE GREENHOUSE

In June 1998, we purchased 14 Hartington Gardens, Edinburgh, which was a run down conventional Guesthouse. Shortly afterwards, The Greenhouse was born.

The Greenhouse has, in the last three years, undergone extensive renovation, decoration and refurbishment including the increase of ensuite bathroom facilities.

From personal experience and anecdotal evidence we felt that vegetarians and vegans were, in general, badly catered for in many "traditional" guesthouses. We had previously discussed the possibility of opening a guest house at some point in the future, but this was accelerated following redundancy and we therefore decided that the time was right to bring the idea forward.

We provide exclusively vegetarian/vegan accommodation, using organic and GMO free products where possible. Many of the dishes served are home made, using fresh ingredients including home grown herbs from The Greenhouse garden. We support local vegetarian suppliers such as Engine Shed and Green City Co-operative. We ensure that all products we use are free of animal ingredients, writing to suppliers and manufacturers where necessary for confirmation.

In addition to food, the whole environmental and ethical approach is very important and to this end each room is provided with homemade vegetable soap and shampoo, non feather pillows and duvets. We use long life lightbulbs and as part of the City of Edinburgh recycling initiative, we recycle glass, newspapers, steel and aluminium cans generated by The Greenhouse. Reading literature is available for all guests including publications and leaflets from The Vegetarian Society, Viva, Greenpeace, Friends of the Earth Scotland and Cruelty Free Edinburgh.

On arrival, each guest is given a fully detailed information leaflet prepared by us, summarising the exclusively vegetarian restaurants/cafes in Edinburgh in addition to a map on which their position and routes are clearly marked. Guests are very appreciative of this information in as much as they do not have to search for excellent places to eat and also that we are supporting the vegetarian restaurants/cafes in Edinburgh.

We know that Edinburgh has proved to be a very popular place for both vegetarian and vegan visitors. Today the vegetarian/vegan visitor can relax with a wide variety of exclusively vegetarian cafes, restaurants and health food shops to accommodate their tastes. Edinburgh can also boast in being an international conference centre and tourist destination offering the visitor a wide range of historic, national, artistic and cultural places of interest with something to suit everyone.

We would like to keep The Greenhouse personal and informal as it was always intended to be a place where we too would like to stay, and we are continually looking at ways to expand and improve our already extensive breakfast menu.

In short, our aim is to provide high quality vegetarian/vegan accommodation which encompasses not only the food, but also the whole experience or "The Greenhouse Effect" and we hope that we have succeeded in doing this.

Below is a list of links which we can recommend to you are worth a visit.
(Note these links will open new browser windows - just close the window to return to www.greenhouse-edinburgh.com)

• Mono is a vegan restaurant/cafe/bar and fair trade shop run by the good folk previously at the 13th Note.
• The Vegetarian Society of the United Kingdom.
• Visit the Vegan Village, an online directory of UK-based vegan businesses.
• Vegetarians International Voice for Animals is especially good for kids whose parents are giving you a hard time for being veggie.
• HappyCow is a free vegetarian restaurant & health food store guide, providing a worldwide searchable database currently reaching into cities and towns in 69 countries. Over 3000 businesses are listed.
• Helmsley Walled Garden is a healing garden offering horticultural therapy and a tranquil environment for those in need.