This range of eighteenth century buildings were at West Pans near Musselburgh. William Forrest's map of 1799 shows several such groups arranged in squares, probably the area occupied by the common drying green in this image.

This is a black and white photograph of group of houses. The range starts with single story cottages with pantile roofs. It terminates in a larger building of two stories with dormer windows. An open area in the foreground is a common drying green.

West Pans developed as an industrial community. Activity at the settlement was once dominated by salt panning and then pottery, employing several hundred people and exploiting reserves of clay found in the wooded slope in the background of the image.