Welcome to the Dickins Blog

Welcome to our new blog What The Dickins: A Tale of Edinburgh City. We are ridiculously excited about it. Why? Because there are so many amazing things to do in Edinburgh and we now have a place where we can share them with you!

Essentially, it’s going to be a lifestyle blog about Edinburgh and the myriad of marvellous things there are to see and do here. We’ll be talking about:-

1. Great Things to Do In Edinburgh

Dunbar’s Close, Edinburgh

Edinburgh has such a rich choice of things to do that will create magical memories. We have fabulous museums and art galleries and connections to Royalty with our castles, palaces and a very special yacht. You can be spooked by ghost stories and charmed by the UK’s only giant pandas. We have amazing walks with breathtaking views and secret gardens to sit in and enjoy the quiet for a few minutes. Our culture scene is immense with world-class theatre and music to be enjoyed all year round. History drips from every stone. There are some amazing tours to help you make the very most of your stay and we’ll enjoy sharing those with you too. When you stay in a Dickins self catering apartment we will give you a folder with an Insider Guide of Great Things to Do in Edinburgh.

2. Our Fabulous Festivals

Nowhere in the world does Festivals like Edinburgh. And whilst it’s the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in August and Hogmanay which are the most famous, there’s a festival happening pretty much every month in the city. There’s the Science Festival, The Imaginate Festival, The Magic Festival, The Film Festival, The Jazz and Blues Festival, The Fashion Festival, The Book Festival, The Edinburgh Mela and The Storytelling Festival and more besides. At Dickins we’re devoted festophiles and we can’t wait to share news of our festivals with you.

3. Foodie

Over the years the foodie scene in Edinburgh has exploded. We now have some of the best restaurants in the UK and Edinburgh has become a foodie destination. At Dickins, we love food and so we’re very much looking forward to sharing our delicious discoveries with you. You’ll receive the Dickins Foodie Guide to Edinburgh when you stay in one of our apartments.

4. Family-Friendly

Calton Hill, Edinburgh

As a mother of two small boys, I’m always on the search for the best family-friendly things to do in Edinburgh. So I’m looking forward to sharing the things we already know and to making new discoveries that I can share with you. Self- catering is always the option of choice for my family. It’s such a relief to be able to cook meals my boys want to eat and put a wash on. The biggest joy of all is putting them to bed and being able to sit back and relax in the sitting room with a glass of wine, knowing the children are safe and sound.

5. Shop Until You Drop

Victoria Street, Edinburgh

We all love a retail high and there are so many great shops in Edinburgh for a quick splurge. We’re going to be concentrating on the special shops here which are independent and local to Edinburgh. Oh, just the thought of writing blogs on shopping in Edinburgh has put a spring in my step! We’ve very much enjoyed putting together our new Shop Until You Drop Guide which is available in all our apartments. We love shopping so much that we give each of our guests a stylish Dickins Bag for Life, so you can head out to the shops and live like a local.

6. Home Sweet Home

31 Gayfield Square, Edinburgh

Edinburgh is a city with some absolutely stunning properties. Architectural details, high ceilings, a sense of style, amazing views and a great location are just some of the features of many Dickins self catering apartments and houses. We love our properties to be special and unique and to feel like a home from home. Dickins will help you to create magical memories and to live like a local. We also have properties in all the areas you want to be.  In our blog posts, we’ll be focusing on individual properties and telling you some of the fascinating stories and history behind them.

7. Edinburgh Folk

Greyfriar’s Bobby, Edinburgh

Edinburgh is a city of inventors, thinkers and story-tellers. Today, the city is home to best-selling authors including JK Rowling, Ian Rankin and Alexander McCall Smith who follow in the tradition of literary greats Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Robert Louis Stevenson, JM Barrie and Sir Walter Scott.  In the eighteenth century, during the Scottish Enlightenment, brilliant minds such as David Hume, Adam Smith, Robert Burns, James Boswell, Allan Ramsay, Thomas Carlyle and Henry Raeburn had far-reaching impact throughout the world. In the nineteenth century, doctors at the world renowned University Medical School made significant contributions to the development of medical science and Charles Darwin also studied at the university, making use of the Botanic Gardens to sow the seeds of evolutionary theory. Today, Edinburgh remains home to brilliant minds such as Peter Higgs of Higgs Boson fame and Ian Wilmut who cloned Dolly the sheep. Not forgetting of course our famous dog Greyfriar’s Bobby.

8. Expert Advice

We’ve been letting flats in Edinburgh since 1998 and we’ve learned a fair bit in that time. In this section we’ll be sharing some of our expert tips with you on subjects like Letting for the Edinburgh Festival and When Short Term Letting is a Better Option than Long Term.

9. Competitions

We all love winning. In our blog, we’ll be running regular competitions, working with businesses we collaborate with across Edinburgh to bring you brilliant prizes you really want to win!