Venue for Scotland’s first digital museum announced

The 200-year-old Leith Custom House will be home to Scotland’s first fully digital museum, it has been revealed.

Earlier today, the Scottish Historic Buildings Trust (SHBT) shared plans for the Georgian-era site to become “a town square of the 21st century”.

Under the proposals, the museum will be located across eight exhibition rooms, each equipped with video walls, listening booths, screens and projectors to display the digital content.

It is understood the exhibitions will include historical documents and oral history archives, as well as object scans and digital contemporary art.   

Vision of the digital museum at Leith Custom House | SHBT

The plans, free for the public to view for the next two weeks, are the “largest project the SHBT has undertaken since launching 40 years ago, its director Dr Samuel Gallacher said.

“The digital museum fuses the principles of a civic museum with the innovation of a contemporary digital art gallery. This concept promises a world-leading approach to providing a venue suitable for telling the stories of long ago, empowering people to tell their own stories today, as well as showcasing Leith and Scotland’s outstanding digital creative sector,” Gallacher added.

Located near the shore and built in 1812, the house was initially used for shipbuilding. However, in 1980 it was closed to the public and bought by the National Museum of Antiquities of Scotland – now part of the National Museum of Scotland (NMS) – which used it for storage.

In 2015, after the NMS revealed it was going to sell the building, City of Edinburgh Council stepped in to buy it, later appointing SHBT to complete a feasibility study to ensure a sustainable future for the house. 

Following community consultation, the plans published today build on the preferred option from the study.

The scheme, designed by Richard Murphy Architects, will also see community-creative studios for artists and makers, along with other retail, and leisure options based on the ground floor.

Sam Gallacher and Richard Murphy | SHBT

South of the border, various historic sites adopted the digital museum initiative after they were forced to close their doors during the pandemic. For example, the Hastings Digital Museum offers a collection of items from the Hastings Museum and Art Gallery.