Historic Environment Scotland (HES) has awarded Birse Community Trust grant funding to conserve and reopen The Souter’s Shop in Birse, a purpose-built shoemaker’s shop left largely untouched for over half a century and the only surviving example of its kind.
Opened in 1897, the Souter’s Shop was run by local shoemaker James Merchant and his son until the 1940s. After business ceased, the shop lay completely undisturbed for 60 years, its tools, ledgers and fittings frozen in time. When it was rediscovered in 1999, it provided a rare window to another time, a piece of built heritage telling the story of a rural craftsperson and how small-scale industries operated at the time.
Birse Community Trust has been awarded £74,500 from Historic Environment Scotland (HES) through the Historic Environment Grants (HEG) Programme to repair and conserve the fabric of the shop. Repairs are needed on the roof, timber, chimney and the joinery glazing, and the interior will also be opened to visitors on site and across the globe with a virtual exhibition and online tour. Funding will also support traditional skills training, ensuring that the shop’s features are restored using techniques similar to those employed when originally built.
Listed as a category A building in 2000, the Souter’s Shop is recognised as nationally significant and the only known example of its kind in Scotland. The building and its contents show a world before commercial, mass-produced shoemaking became prevalent, and the Birse Community Trust plan to use the building to explain the historic shoemaking tradition and its place in rural industry. Remarkably, even the shop’s business ledgers have survived, giving insight into the role of the shop as well as the surrounding communities.
Dr Susan O’Connor, Head of Grants at HES, said:
“The Souter’s Shop in Birse is a fascinating building with an important story to tell. We are excited to support the Trust's efforts to unlock this story with the community and the wider public."
"Our historic environment is one of Scotland’s greatest assets, but it needs care, investment and collaboration to thrive. Our grants programmes are available to help communities unlock the history, knowledge and progress that is embodied in the built heritage around them.”
Toni Watt, Manager at Birse Community Trust, said:
“BCT are absolutely delighted to receive such generous funding from Historic Environment Scotland. This grant together with support from other funders and from many individuals means that we are able to start work to save the Souter’s Workshop and Shop. It is such a special place."
"To enter the Souter’s feels like you are stepping back in time. It is a window into a now disappeared way of life, showcasing the life of a souter and his role in rural society."
“At one time every settlement would have had a Souter; our visitors tell us about grandparents who were souters, but in a few more generations this tradition will be lost from memory. History, oral history and saving the rural architecture where this history takes place matters so much.”
Work is now starting to train volunteers to pack and decant the collection of artefacts in the Souter’s Shop, as well as basic conservation work. Repair works on the building will begin in spring 2026.
