Creating Scotland's first fully digital museum on Leith's Shore
Ambitious Custom House redesign hopes to attract Visitor Levy funding
Leith Custom House was built in 1812, and was the first Custom House in Scotland, predating the huge ports of Glasgow and Dundee.
Looming large at the Shore in Leith, it was designed to be an imposing reminder of governmental power, placed so that every ship entering Leith’s two docks had to pass behind it. It is also the only port custom house to have escaped modern redevelopment.
The Custom House ceased operations in 1980, and spent 35 years as a storage facility for the National Museum of Scotland. In 2015, the building went up for sale, and thanks to local campaigns and public funds the building was purchased by City of Edinburgh Council. Since then it has been used as a creative space for local artists, but the plan was always to turn it into something much bigger. The new Visitor Levy might provide the funding for an innovative new visitor attraction at the heart of the Shore.
“Leith is advertised in Lonely Planet as a cool, must-see part of your weekend in Edinburgh… but we need another anchor attraction,” says Samuel Gallacher, Director of Scottish Historic Buildings Trust. Yesterday, SHBT launched plans for a five-year restoration of the building in partnership with Leith Civic Trust and the City of Edinburgh Museums and Galleries Service.
Scotland’s first fully digital museum
During consultations on the best use for Custom House, a museum came consistently top of the list. But how to make that feasible? And how could it be unique compared to Edinburgh's already impressive museum offering?
The answer: Scotland's first fully digital museum. Not phone links and ipads, but large-scale immersive experiences, video walls and integrated audio; “When things are big scale, it completely changes the human experience,” says Gallacher. A fully digital museum provides many opportunities that traditional spaces do not - from photography and filmmaking to contemporary news or civic history, almost anything can be displayed in a digital museum. Displays can also change with the click of a button; a digital museum could schedule several exhibitions in a day, depending on the target audience.
Gallacher points out that there is an increasing amount of art produced in digital formats - Leith Custom House would be the UK’s first gallery dedicated to digital art.
One of the first exhibitions at the Leith Custom House will be a new exhibition of 100 objects which display the history of Leith, and SHBT are anticipating that local groups will be able to curate their own exhibitions for the museum, as well as welcoming international displays.
The existing purpose of the building will be integrated into this vision too; artists studios and workspaces will still be in part of the building, with an added focus on resources for digital industries. The difference is that these spaces will be more public, aiming to widen access to careers in digital media.
A town square for the 21st century
Access is the key to the architectural designs for the much-needed building renovation. The building is without doubt in need of some TLC; the building’s oil boiler is believed to have been sourced from a boat in times gone by, and the not-so-young mechanic who knows how to fix it does not have an apprentice. Let’s not even consider the environmental cost of the heating system.
But the renovation will be about more than zero-carbon heating systems and fixing the leaky roof - SHBT and their partners want to transform the imposing, authoritative structure into a truly open and inviting space for all. “From an architectural point of view, we want to make sure this building feels comfortable so that when you’ve done your shopping at Aldi, you can walk through with an Aldi shopping bag and not feel self conscious,” Gallacher says.
In practice, this is going to be achieved by opening up several fully accessible entrances, on all sides of the building. The designs by architect Richard Murphay include an “indoor street” similar to (albeit much smaller than) the St James Quarter. “We want it to be a town square for the 21st century,” says Gallacher.
Just another step in gentrification?
“Gentrification is a term that is used when you get that hostility between different kinds of wealth in a community, and it doesn't have to be that,” says Gallacher. “If there's a community civic spirit, and there's a sense of understanding of identity and a shared identity, no matter how wealthy you are and you want place you're living into the best place possible.”
While Leith has gone from eight decades of being blacklisted for mortgages, to one of the most fashionable spots in town, there are concerns about the impact of that change. Particularly that those who've lived in the area for decades will be priced out of their homes and the local amenities, as often happens when urban areas see large investment and development.
SHBT aims to address this by working with the Leith Civic Trust, who will eventually take on management of the Custom House and its galleries. The Civic Trust, who were heavily involved in the campaign to save Custom House in 2015, will also receive support and training from SHBT to widen their membership and gain the relevant experience to manage a museum.
The Trust is fund raising and hopes to secure support from the city’s Visitor Levy fund which is expected to raise up to £50 million a year once it is fully up and running.
Twenty training positions are to be made available to locals who will learn the necessary skills for managing museums, including visits to similar museums across Europe. They hope that by training a cross section of Leith’s population, they can achieve a space which works for everyone.
“We want to make the project a solution rather than a contributing factor,” says Gallacher.
The project has already secured key backing, including that of the city council.
Council leader Jane Meagher, pictured below at the launch of the community partnership between the city council, SHBT and Leith Civic Trust, says: “We are thrilled to be partnering with Leith Civic Trust to help us realise the long-held community desire for a museum for Leith. The ambition has always been for this museum to be managed by the community through a community-led charitable trust who would ensure that the museum responds to local needs and aspirations, Leith Civic Trust will help us realise this goal together.
“This project has been a long-time in development, but following the agreement last year with Edinburgh Museums & Galleries, we are delighted that the project now has real momentum”
It’ll be 2030 before the new Leith Custom House hopefully opens its doors. Judging by the last five years, Leith may well be a completely different place by then. The building will undoubtedly be an impressive visitor attraction, but will a local training scheme and an open-access space be enough to combat the tension and inequality that gentrification can bring? It’s hard to tell.
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