The partners to the scheme , The Gorebridge Community Development Trust, Midlothian Council and Historic Environment Scotland are organising a small celebration event this evening in the Trust's office , 58 Main Street Gorebridge to celebrate the completion of the 5 year scheme and to thank all the funders, partners and participants for making it a success. Please see attached invite which is open to all as part of Midlothian's Heritage Week . 

Much has been achieved over the 5 years of the scheme , briefly , 28 properties benefiting from repair and restoration grant aid , 56 trainees completed the traditional construction skills courses and 30 schoool pupils completed the schoold heritage awareness courses. Many community engagement projects were carried out focussing on local history and heritage themes with local schools, community groups and other local groups in Gorebridge . Additional funding was secured to further build on and enhance the work of the CARS, ie the Government's Climate Change Challenge Fund , The Borders Railway Blueprint Fund , Heritage Lottery funding for First World War projects and Leader and the Railway Heritage Fund for the repair and  restoration of Gorebridge station. 

As part of the 2 week celebration of the completion of the Gorebridge CARS a number of events have taken place that were well attended by the local commumity .The events were organised between 12th March to the 26th March.Here are some photos and brief descriptions of what took place :

Newbyres Castle site.Tuesday 13th March. The Gorebridge Community Development Trust have adopted the Scheduled Ancient Monument as part of the "adopt a monument scheme" with Archaeology Scotland  . This day was organised  to faciliate some hands on investigations . Dr Piers Dixon and Eve Boyle archaeologists from Historic Environment Scotland came out to give a historical interpretation tour of the castle site and  surrounding area, there were 2D sketch design survey workshops and a 2D measured survey workshop . The day was a great success and the next stage will be more vegetation clearance and a geophysical survey of the site.

Photos of the day

Stobmill Gunpowder Works

Sean Watson , the CARS Archivist lead a guided walk on Tuesday 13th March , 10 people attended and were intriged to discover some of the history of the site .

Over the next few weeks Addymann Archaeology are carrying out a study of the site for the CARS scheme to see how access and interpretation can be improved in the future as part of the Gorebridge Heritage Trail.

Photos of some of the remains , Stobmill Gunpowder works site.

Printing Workshops 

Local artist Fiona Maher held a drop in printing workshop on Saturady 17th March and then following on from that organised two days (21st March, 23rd March ) of out and about , exploring the marks and insignia from around Gorebridge using block printing techniques to print them onto fabric and paper. She has recorded a number of interesting items such as cast iron drainage and untility covers in the streets , signs , orginal door furniture fittings , and other historical street artifacts that help to make up the character of Gorebridge. The results will be recorded in a book. 

Photos of Fiona Maher recording and taking block prints

Biodiversity Day 

This was a drop in event for all ages  at St Margarets Church Hall on the 14th March . The Railway Adopters were celebrating the importance of local plants, animals, birds and insects with a day of workshops and activities. Taking part were Greening Gorebridge,RSPB,Scottish Wildlife Trust and the Bat Conservation Trust. Children made wildflower and seed bombs , they helped to build bat boxes and were entertained by Dr Bunheads amazing climate action puppet show .

Photos of Dr Bunheads amazing climate action puppet show

 Storytelling sessions for schools , nurseries and community groups

Over a few days , March 12th , 19th , 15th , and 22nd storytelling sessions were organised in schools and in other local venues including the Pop up Beacon . Fergus McNicol and Ronnie Fairweather were engaged to deliver some of the stories to the children  performing their unique mixture of music, poems , songs and an array of heritage tales to inspire and entertain .A great time was had by all.  

Bread Share Event,21st March 2018 

Gorebridge Community Development Trust put on a bread Share event at the 'Pop Up Beacon', in partnership with The Royal Botanic Garden in Edinburgh  .

Andy Croft and Max Coleman from the Botanics gave a presentation about bread share . The Botanics have worked with 'Scotland the Bread' to look at how we grow our wheat and whether we could have better, more local and nutritious grain and bread production.The Botanics are also working with a EU project looking at food security, specifically how to engage the public in discussing issues around the gulf between the great food that Scotland produces and people who have access to it . Too often it seems that many people have problems in accessing nutriitious food and as a result have a poor diet.

Theo from a bakery in Stirling gave a presentation about the importance of healthy food and the well being aspects of baking bread which was quite inspiring .

About 20 pepole attended the event . ,many of whom had issues with industrial bread, interested where it comes from and had an interest in making their own, or interest in supporting community bakeries. This could be relevant to the station building where the cafe could provide locally baked bread  .

Gorebridge Community Developoment Trust and Midlothian Council are working with Historic Environment Scotland to deliver two weeks of workshops,talks and events planned to celebrate the completion of the Gorebridge CARS(2013-2018), sharing and exlporing the rich and diverse history and heritage of Gorebridge. 

Please see attached leaflet with all the events set out. Discover new activity groups and places of interest in your local area.All events are free and open to anyone to attend.Please check the details of each event as some require booking of a place.Please go to www.gorebridge.org.uk for details.

Please click here to download the leaflet.

Gorebridge Community Developoment Trust and Midlothian Council are working with Historic Environment Scotland to deliver two weeks of workshops,talks and events planned to celebrate the completion of the Gorebridge CARS(2013-2018), sharing and exlporing the rich and diverse history and heritage of Gorebridge. 

Please see attached leaflet with all the events set out. Discover new activity groups and places of interest in your local area.All events are free and open to anyone to attend.Please check the details of each event as some require booking of a place.Please go to www.gorebridge.org.uk for details.

Please click here to download the leaflet.

On 21st February 2018 as part of the continuing programme to enhance the setting of this Scheduled Ancient Moument and eventually improve access and interpretation a morning  was spent clearing vegetation followed by lunch...home made soup at Gorebridge Community Development Trust's office and a talk about the Adopt a Monument Scheme . 8 volunteers helped with the work .The day was rorganised by Gail Halvorsen, a former Trust Board Member and now volunteer and Cara Jones from Archaeology Scotland . Archaeology Scotland have assisted the Trust to adopt the monument and have advised on the best way forward to clear vegetation to reveal the extent of the remains. The next phase of the programme will be to carry out a drawn survey and then a geophysical survey of the site to be able to ascertain it's extact extent to then plan for consolidating the remains and improving understanding of it's architecture and history .

The next date will be the 13th march , the programme for the day will be :

10am: Archaeological /historical interpretation tour of the castle remains and surrounding area by Dr Piers Dixon, archaeologist from Historic Environment Scotland and Eve Boyle , field archaeologist at RCAHMS.

11.00am : 2D sketch design survey workshop

1.00pm: Lunch at the Trust's  office.

2.00-4.00pm 2D measured survey workshop on site .

Photos from the 21st February :

As part of the additional funding from Historic Environment Scotland we have been able to carry out additional engagement work with local schools about the history and heritage of their local area. Pupils from St Andrews,Stobhill,Newtongrange and Goreglen participated in story telling . Last week they performed their story on how to protect the environment with story cards and songs created by them with the support of Macastory(Fergus McNicol and Ron Fairweather).

The whole school participated in a story telling performance.10 children were selected by the Head Teacher to become the "Mac and Cheese" story tellers. The group work with Fergus and Ronnie for two full days with skills workshops and activities to build confidence, support creativity and make a positive difference to their learning which all supports the aims of the school community.

The group's finale was to perform their show to the nursery class to a rapturous encore.The story telling groups from the schools that took part in this project will meet on the 14th March to share their stories with each other.