The Edinburgh Minute ⏰: Weekend edition 29 Sept - 1 Oct 2023
Last minute STL rush, local creatives react to funding cut + your essential weekend guide
☀️ Good morning Edinburgh. Here’s your Friday Edinburgh Minute and ‘what’s on’ guide.
🔑 People who want to rent out rooms in their property have until this Sunday to apply for a short term let (STL) licence. The council site has more information.
⮑ There has been a rush in recent days of people applying for their STL licence. Andrew Brough spotted eight notices of application on the entrance of a stair on the Royal Mile.
⮑ The spread of STLs in the Grassmarket is demonstrated in this TikTok video which went viral yesterday. Thanks to reader Sophie for sharing.
⮑ The crackdown on STLs is ‘about safety, not increasing home availability’, according to housing minister Paul McLennan. - He spoke with Conor Matchett in The Steamie podcast.
💰 Creative Scotland has warned 2,000 arts jobs could be at risk after the Scottish Government imposed a last-minute £6.6m budget cut. - Rachel Amery, The Scotsman.
“We are extremely disappointed to report that the £6.6m budget has not been included in the Autumn Budget Revisions.” - Creative Scotland.
⮑ The £6.6 million cut to Creative Scotland’s budget was first announced last December. After much uproar, this decision was reversed in February. However, it’s now emerged the cut has been reinstated, with its second U-turn bringing the Scottish Government full circle, back to where it started. This is ‘the price of incompetence in high places’ according to The Scotsman’s editorial comment column today.
⮑ Last night Brian Ferguson called it ‘the biggest betrayal of Scottish culture, artists & performers in modern times’.
⮑ Among those protesting the cut are Debbie Hannan, Associate Director at National Theatre of Scotland, and theatre maker Robbie Gordon of Traverse:
“A recent study shows the overall economic impact of the festival alone is £407 million to the Edinburgh economy in 2022 and £367 million to the Scottish economy at the same time. A 6.6 million cut is negligible comparatively.” - Robbie Gordon, Traverse Theatre.
⮑ Edinburgh-based Laura Jones-Rivera of publisher 404 Ink said: “Those lucky enough to be in receipt of funding are *this* close to closing because it's barely enough to survive, the free labour on top is increasingly not worth it. Those out of reach of funding are even further away.”
⮑ Campaign for the Arts has launched a new petition ‘to urge the Scottish Government to keep its promise’. As of this morning it has had 3,220 signatures.
🖼 In contrast, £36m was spent on the new National Galleries building at the Mound, which re-opens this weekend. Its boss Sir John Leighton is retiring in February. He admitted its inclusion efforts have a ‘long way to go’ to broaden its audience beyond the middle classes and tourists. - Exclusive interview with Severin Carrell, The Guardian.
🚨 The Bridges were shut at rush hour again last night after a fire at the Cartlon Highland Hotel. - Kevin Quinn, Evening News.
🚉 The Edinburgh Trams website has been hit by ‘a potential cyber attack’. - Calum Loudon, STV News.
🏢 The former Debenhams department store on Princes Street has been put on sale, after current owner Legal & General binned a £50m plan to turn it into a hotel. - Emma Newlands, The Scotsman.
☕️ Princes Street’s only independent coffee shop has made ‘a desperate plea to locals’ for support after showing a day’s takings totalled £24. - Katie Williams, Edinburgh Live.
☕️ Saturday will be the last day of business for Frederick Street’s Eteatek tea room. Owners said the decision means they ‘now have the flexibility to work with more businesses and to hold space for unique tea events all over Edinburgh and the UK, including in our tea events space in 121 Giles St, Leith.’ - Eteaket on Facebook.
🏗 Locals in Eyre Place, Rodney Street and Eyre Place Lane are getting together to oppose two new planning applications for 139 purpose built student flats and seven townhouses. - Phyllis Stephen, The Edinburgh Reporter.
📰 The October issue of volunteer-led community magazine C&B News, serving communities in the upper Water of Leith valley, is now available: digitally, from candbnews.com and in print from this weekend in selected retail outlets across Balerno, Currie, Juniper Green, Baberton Mains, and Colinton. (See website for full list.) “As usual, this new issue includes news, views and interviews—by, about and of interest to current and past local residents.” - Thanks to editor Paul Fisher Cockburn for getting in touch.
🖋 A new Edinburgh-themed watercolour set has been launched by local stationary stockist Libraries & Archives Paper Co. It’s full of colours related to the local landscape and tenements, to help painters recreate Edinburgh’s surroundings. The company celebrates its third birthday this weekend with a pop-up at its studio in St Leonards. They said: “We see Arthur’s Seat and Salisbury Crags outside our studio every day, and walk through the blonde sandstone tenement streets, the lush green of summer vegetation in the city’s parks and the flaming earth-tones that emerge in autumn. The big moods of cloudy days and the many shades of the sea off our coasts, it’s a feast for the eyes and we wanted to celebrate that beauty with some specially chosen paints.” - More details on their website.
🎤 Singer Imogen Heap is in Edinburgh today for the Creative Informatics Innovation Showcase at Central Hall. There are also lots of local organisations involved on panels discussing how creativity is powered by connections. - It’s a free all-day event and the full line-up is on Eventbrite.
🎨 Designer Sam Buckley’s ‘riotously colourful and immaculately upgraded three-bedroom flat on the first floor of a Victorian mansion block in Edinburgh’s New Town’ has gone on the market for £850,000. - Malcolm Jack of The Times took a look around. [subscription required].
⮑ There are more pictures inside the house here on Sam’s website.
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