provisional Itinerary - open palace PROGRAMME scotland 2024
This programme offers you the opportunity for invaluable hands -on experience working alongside heritage specialists, gaining privileged access to collections behind the scenes at key heritage sites in Scotland.
Please note that some details may change but this itinerary will be kept up to date.
Applications for this programme will be accepted from May 2023.
Saturday 11th May 2024
Arrive in the incomparable World Heritage City of Edinburgh: meet your Open Palace programme leader, settle into your accommodation and enjoy a welcome tea.
Dugald Stewart Monument, Edinburgh
Gilmerton Cove, photo by John Dale (CC BY SA 2.0)
Sunday 12th May 2024
Induction day – a chance to get to know Edinburgh and find out more about the programme with a wonderful walking tour. With a rich history Edinburgh is packed with historic architecture and hidden nooks and crannies, underground passageways, secret tunnels and mysterious Old Town closes.
Monday 13th May 2024
You will take part in a fascinating practical session at the Royal Collection sites of the Palace of Holyroodhouse and The Queen’s Gallery. The Palace of Holyroodhouse is the official residence of the Monarchy in Scotland. Founded as a monastery in 1128 at the end of the Royal Mile in Edinburgh, the Palace of Holyroodhouse is a very significant site indeed in terms of Scottish history. Best known as the home of Mary, Queen of Scots, the Palace was the setting for many dramatic episodes in her short reign.
Holyroodhouse
Riddles Court, Falkland Palace
Tuesday 14th May 2024
We will visit The Royal Yacht Britannia. We will meet the front of House staff and enjoy a cream tea on deck. The Royal Yacht Britannia played host to some of the world’s most famous people, from Nelson Mendela to Winston Churchill, but above all was home for the British Royal Family for over 40 years. Britannia sailed on her maiden voyage from Portsmouth to Grand Harbour, Malta, departing on 14 April and arriving on 22 April 1954. The Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh embarked on Britannia for the first time in Tobruk on 1 May 1954. She is now Now berthed in Leith, Edinburgh,
Wednesday 15th May 2024
You will meet the team at the Surgeons' Hall Museums which comprise the Pathology Museum, the History of Surgery Museum and The Dental Collection. Originally developed as a teaching museum for students of medicine, SHM's fascinating collections, including bone and tissue specimens, artefacts and works of art, have been open to the public since 1832.
Surgeons' Hall, photo by Kim Traynor (CC BY-SA 3.0)
Tranquair
Thursday 16th and Friday 17th May 2024
On Thursday 16th May we will visit Abbotsford which was the home of the influential writer Sir Walter Scott. The rooms visitors can discover at Abbotsford were left just as Scott kept them after his death and are packed full of the fascinating items he collected. Amongst them is one of the best examples in the world of an 19th Century writer’s personal library. .On Friday we will spend a day at Traquair, Scotland’s oldest inhabited house. Visited by 27 Scottish Kings and Queens Traquair dates back to 1107 and has been lived in by the Stuart family since 1491. We will explore the archives and the textiles collections, have a splendid programme dinner in the Eighteenth century dining room and a ghost tour.
Saturday 18th May 2024
We will also be visiting Roman Vindolanda at Hadrian’s Wall. Formerly a key military post on the northern frontier of Britain, Vindolanda is the home of Britain’s ‘Top Treasure’ – the Vindolanda Writing Tablets – and is one Europe's most important Roman archaeological sites, with live excavations taking place there each year. We will undertake a fascinating workshop on archaeological drawing and enjoy a Roman lunch.
Roman Vindolanda at Hadrian’s Wall, photo by Optimist on the run (CC BY SA 3.0)
Alnwick Castle
Monday 20th May 2024 We will cross the border into northern England for a special tour of Alnwick Castle, one of the largest inhabited castles in the UK, which has been home to the Duke of Northumberland’s family, the Percys, for over 700 years. Combining magnificent medieval architecture with Italianate state rooms, Alnwick Castle is a northern treasure house. The property features as the magnificent Brancaster Castle in Downton Abbey, and was the setting for Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry in the Harry Potter films.
Tuesday 21st May 2024
On Day 12 we will travel to Helensburgh, overlooking the River Clyde, to enjoy what is universally regarded as ‘Charles Rennie Mackintosh’s finest domestic creation’. The Hill House mixes Arts and Crafts, Art Nouveau, Scottish Baronial and Japonisme architecture and design, almost all created by Mackintosh and his wife Margaret Macdonald. Much of the house has been restored to its original condition in 1904 when Glasgow publisher Walter Blackie and his family moved in. We will undertake several hands-on projects linked to the conservation and interpretation of the site and collection working with their expert staff.
The Hill House
Kelvingrove Art Gallery & Museum
Wednesday 22nd May 2024
We will spend our day on the beautiful Island of Bute which has borne witness to many key periods in Scotland’s history. Standing stones and Bronze Age burial sites serve as testimony to the island’s ancient past; a past that has witnessed attacks across the ages from Viking raids to Cromwellian occupation. We will visit the extraordinary palace of Mount Stuart. Arguably the finest piece of domestic architecture to emerge from Britain's Gothic revival in the 19th century, this lavish palace boasts a majestic marble hall, an awe-inspiring white marble chapel, sumptuous accommodation and unspeakably rich reception rooms. Mount Stuart was the first home in the world to have a heated indoor swimming pool, and the first in Scotland to be purpose built with electric light, central heating, a telephone system and a Victorian passenger lift. Most of these are still in use today and we will learn the secrets of their restoration and interpretation.
Thursday 23rd May 2024
We will explore the magnificent Inveraray Castle which has been standing on the shores of Loch Fyne since the 1400s, although the impressive castle we know today was inspired by a sketch by Vanbrugh, the architect of Blenheim Palace and Castle Howard in the 1700s. The foundation stone was laid in 1746 and what followed was the construction - to a design by the architects Roger Morris and William Adam - of a truly modern, baroque, Palladian and Gothic-style castle, architecturally before its time
Photo of Drawing Room from Mount Stuart Facebook Page
Inveraray Castle
Friday 24th May 2024
In the morning we will visit the Huntarian Collections Study Centre.
Then we will be visiting the newly refurbished Burrell Collection in Glasgow to discuss its refurbishment. A staggering 9,000 objects form The Burrell Collection. Highlights include one of the most significant holdings of Chinese art in the UK, medieval treasures including stained glass, arms and armour and over 200 tapestries which rank amongst the finest in the world, and paintings by renowned French artists including Manet, Cezanne and Degas. The programme finished on the morning of Saturday 25th June when we check out of our accommodation.
Saturday 25th May 2024
In the morning we will travel to Ardgowan House which is a fabulous late 18th-century mansion and estate on the Firth of Clyde near Inverkip, Scotland which opened its doors to the public only very recently. The Ardgowan estate has been held by the Stewart family since the early 15th century. The present house was begun in 1797, and is currently the seat of the Shaw Stewart baronets. The family will be showing us around the house and sharing the challenges they face in securing the long term future of the house. After which we will be having tea in the splendid Drawing room. We will travel back to Glasgow where the programme will end.
