Sugarhouse Lane, Aberdeen

Image: © Ian Dodds Taken: 27 Nov 2022

Whilst doing a bit of research about this street - prompted by the black plaque attached to the building on the right - I stumbled across a very informative unfussy website called DoricColumns, which is full of information about, and pictures of, old Aberdeen. The building on the right (which I probably should have got a picture of, all things considered!) is listed, and the Doric site has just copied and pasted (which is fair enough) the write-up on the Canmore site about it. Canmore is the archeological arm of Historic Environment Scotland, who do the building listings. They used to be separate though, which may explain why, alongside some black and white 1970s photos of the quayside entrance to the street. Canmore state that the building on the right is the old sugar refinery, built in the 1770s, whereas Historic Scotland reckon it wasn't built until the early 19th Century. The fact that there was once a sugar refinery is not in question. It was fairly short- lived though, closing down after just 20 years. In 1970 the building on the left corner was different, and according to Canmore was the old sugar warehouse. It is hard to tell from old maps whether the street was around at the time of the 'sugar house', but it seems likely that it was, and that the premises straddled the narrow lane. At some point a short two-storey terrace was built in front of what might have once been the old refinery; for unknown reasons it was knocked down between the 1980s and the 2000s. Contrary to popular belief (including mine) it turns out that as a population we in the UK actually consume less sugar per person than we did a hundred years ago. Sugar consumption obviously rocketed in the 1700s and 1800s, when it was a new thing, but seems to have peaked around 1900. Therefore arguments are had about the link between sugar and diabetes - is it other factors in people's diets causing it, or are we now consuming the 'wrong' types of sugar?

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