The Bailie occupies a sunken corner unit on St Stephen Street in Stockbridge, first opened in the 1870s as the Grand Bar before Hamish Henderson bought it in 1971 and renamed it after a contemporary theatre production. The current owners doubled the pub's floor space during the 1980s by extending into the neighbouring cellars, adding the kitchen and dining room that now serves burgers, IPA-battered haddock and haggis-stuffed chicken until quarter to nine each evening. Two permanent cask ales, including Timothy Taylor Landlord, sit alongside two rotating guest beers mostly from Scottish breweries. The low-ceilinged bar has no fruit machines or jukebox, relying instead on conversation, a Tuesday quiz and live music on Friday nights. Photographs of the bar's bohemian regulars from the 1960s and 1970s still hang on the walls.
Surveyed