Like many successful businesses, the story of Alien Rock begins with three people bored with their existing jobs. Steve Irvine and Reuben Welch were climbing  partners based at the Royal Navy shore base of HMS Sultan in Portsmouth. Their local wall wasn’t steep enough so they decided to build themselves a new and better one on the base. Armed with this new DIY knowledge they then decided that running an even bigger climbing centre in “civvy street” would be more entertaining than engineering and they could also avoid going to sea, where the crags were few and far between. This is where the dream would have ended for most people, however since the Forces were taking voluntary redundancies they managed to get paid to escape. At the same time, Malcolm Davies, Steves former climbing partner had similar aims and he also decided to pack in his job.

So with every pound that they had or could borrow they bought an old church in Newhaven, Edinburgh and formed the partnership “Alien Rock”.The name “Alien Rock” was probably invented by a climbing friend ,Craig Hay, at a brainstorming session in the Peak District. It was based on a screen printed T-shirt that Reuben and Steve had made whilst planning a fall-back business option !  Back in Edinburgh, the tensions were high since rumour had it that another climbing team were also looking to build a wall -although the church at 8 Pier Place was considered too small for their plan. Although the church had been used as a Nautilus gym, it still had three huge seating galleries and all the stained glass windows could still be seen.

In a giant cloud of dust the first gallery disappeared over the winter of 1993/4 to be replaced by a strange metal skeleton of  angle iron and strangely shaped plywood . This formed the slab area, old main wall, pocket wall and one vertical wall that stretched to the beginners area. At this time, only “The Foundry” in Sheffield and Bristol Climbing Centre existed as dedicated climbing centres so there was a lot still to be learned.  All the original bolt-on holds were made from moulds that had in turn been moulded from carved bits of concrete block. They came in a variety of shades depending on who made them and how intoxicated by the fumes they were.On April 2nd 1994 Alien Rock officially opened its doors to climbers.

The first climbers through the door were Viv Cox and Donald Leckie,  Nearly twelve years later the membership numbers are now nearly forty thousand. A climber ,keen to swap her sign writing skills for free climbing, appeared during the first few weeks of construction and in do so April Marr managed to talk herself into becoming the first employee at the wall. The current staff list includes about 15 names and over fifty different people have been employed at some point or other.

From doing further research, the technique for building curved walls was discovered and also the ability to make interesting holds and features in-situ. With these skills the wavy walls and tower were laboriously built. Building work finished at 3pm every day to allow an hour to clear up before the wall opened to the public. The floors were still bare wood and piles of steel lay about ready for the following day. Fumes from the fibreglassing hung about for weeks and everything was covered by a thick layer of dust.

The reception area at the time was where the leading area now stands. It was demolished along with the second seating gallery in  the Autumn of 1995, shortly after the new reception, toilets and changing room were built. The need for some steeper walls was evident so a bouldering wall was added first on the remains of the final gallery. Once the reception had moved a new concrete floor was cast and the leading walls were fabricated. This took quite some time since the frames were too large to build entirely on the floor with the public inside, so they were welded together while the partners hung on ropes or balanced  precariously on a ten meter high skinny scaffold tower. Amazingly, everyone lived to tell the tale !

By about 1996 it was clear that the rumours about another wall were true, when the Ratho Quarry Company announced its vision for what is now the National Rock Climbing Centre / Adventure centre. As a result, enthusiasm amongst the three partners to expand Alien Rock any further was non existent . To keep them occupied in the meantime two climbing walls were built for the Army in Edinburgh, one in Callander, several private bouldering walls (including Leith Police station !) and one at Linlithgow.  With access to workshop facilities it was also an ideal time to make the giant blobs and new panels for the slab, pocket and vertical walls. A hard wearing version was developed to protect the panels from beginners dragging their feet ! To reduce the noise and protect climbers ankles, new rubber matting was also installed and this has saved many people from experiencing the side-effect of poor belaying.

Eventually in Spring 2000 it was clear that there was a demand for a bigger bouldering facility in Edinburgh. Climbers were actually going back to the old wall at Dunfermline to escape the crowds, so it was decided to take a risk and build the  dedicated bouldering centre Alien Rock 2  This opened on West Bowling Green Street, Leith in march 2001 with a 50 problem competition.  The extra space for climbing has definitely helped relieve some of the pressure on a busy week night !

Since then there have been many minor improvements , some obvious but many on an organisational level. The climbing scene in Scotland has also changed quite substantially since 1994 when almost all indoor climbers climbed outside as soon as the weather allowed. Nowadays indoor climbing has developed into a valid sport in its own right and Alien Rock has helped play a large part in that development.

And what of the future ?  Since the National Rock Climbing Centre at Ratho was purchased by the City Council in Autumn 2005 it is unclear where indoor climbing in Edinburgh is heading. What is certain however is that through its sustainable development and operation by enthusiastic climbers, Alien Rock will provide the best facilities it can for climbers for many more years to come.