The Nationwide Galleries of Scotland (NGS) is ready to obtain £56 million in funding to start development on The Artwork Works, a serious new free-to-visit gallery in north Edinburgh. The Scottish authorities has dedicated to offering the funding over the subsequent three years.
Development on The Artwork Works is ready to start this summer season in Granton, a waterfront neighbourhood in North Edinburgh. The gallery will home greater than 130,000 artworks, which guests will be capable to work together with. On this approach, the director-general of the NGS, Anne Lyden, has in contrast The Artwork Works to the V&A East Storehouse in London. Guests will be capable to pull out storage racks containing work, and use viewing rooms to look by pictures and drawings.
The Artwork Works is a central characteristic of the NGS’s 2026-30 strategic plan, which focuses on bettering entry to Scotland’s nationwide artwork assortment. At current, solely 3% of the NGS assortment is on show in its galleries or out on mortgage.
Chatting with The Artwork Newspaper, Lyden stated: “The remaining 97% [of the collection] is in storage that’s costly, laborious to entry, overcrowded and not match for objective, placing Scotland’s artwork at enormous danger. The Artwork Works is our resolution.” The warehouse will home all of those beforehand hidden works. The area can even assist to realize the NGS’s ambition that each youngster and younger particular person may have the chance to work together with their nation’s paintings. Lyden continues: “Pull out the racks to see Scotland’s artwork, attend an occasion, or have a picnic within the grounds. Will probably be yours to find.”
The full estimated price to create the constructing was cited in The Herald as at the least £100m, although Lyden says it’s “tough to place remaining price on the mission given international uncertainty” and that the NGS “will be capable to present a full replace forward of opening”. She provides the organisation is hoping “to safe the remaining capital from each the UK authorities and philanthropic donors”.
A optimistic step
Information of the £56 million dedication from the Scottish authorities is a optimistic growth for the nation’s arts sector. In recent times, many Scottish cultural organisations have suffered from monetary uncertainty. In 2024, for instance, V&A Dundee completely halved the variety of main exhibitions it levels to at least one a 12 months, citing the necessity to minimize prices amid “a risky working atmosphere” exacerbated by the price of residing disaster and hovering inflation. There have, nonetheless, been indicators of enchancment. In 2025, Inventive Scotland awarded £200m in funding for 251 Scottish arts organisations to cowl the next subsequent three years. This January, in the meantime, the Scottish authorities introduced that the humanities and tradition sectors would obtain a authorities funding of £266.3m, £70m greater than the earlier 12 months.
The announcement of presidency help for The Artwork Works in the meantime comes within the wake of an impartial report by the consultancy BiGGAR Economics which estimates that the NGS contributed £253 million to Scotland’s economic system through tourism, jobs and cultural exercise within the monetary 12 months 2024/25.
Lyden, nonetheless, emphasises that points lie forward. “We nonetheless have the very actual challenges that each one cultural organisations are going through as funding for the humanities continues to be unsure,” she says. “We’re extremely lucky that our three galleries are lovely, historic buildings, however these include the very actual prices related to an ageing property. Like many different arts and cultural organisations, we all know the shifting international panorama coupled with monetary uncertainty will proceed to be difficult for us all. By investing in entry, participation and infrastructure now, we’re laying the foundations for long-term cultural, social and wellbeing advantages for everybody.”
Alongside The Artwork Works growth, the NGS has additionally introduced main refurbishment work to its current Nationwide Gallery on the Mound in Edinburgh’s metropolis centre. After The Artwork Works is full, plans are in place for a whole overhaul of ranges three and 4 of the William Playfair constructing, which dates again to 1859. Modernised exhibition areas and up to date electrical, plumbing and roof works will be certain that the gallery can operate properly into 2050 and past.
