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Lighting Up the Skerryvore Lighthouse Shore Station: Creating a Sustainable Hub

Proposal code: AP-2025-06-156

To create a sustainable hub for the Isle of Tiree at Hynish, where folk can live, work and visit.

1.  We would like to refurbish Alan Stevenson House (ASH) which offers a locally inspired restaurant and bar with 6 ensuite rooms (1 disabled).  We would also like to upgrade the Harbour with pontoons and seating/viewpoints to take in the wonderful natural environment and encourage people to come by boat to the site in the summer months.  Morton Boyd Hall (MBH) is an excellent multi purpose facility that needs some upgrading and can house any activities going on at the site. Hynish, with its heritage and special quality of place, has the opportunity to develop its local hospitality offer and become a hub for the southern end of the island.  Capturing tourism and events spend, alongside island/day visitor spend would provide a revenue stream.
2. The Skerryvore Lighthouse Shore Station was transferred to the Tiree community in January 2025.  The transition has taken three years.  There are 3 income streams - Housing, Heritage and Business -  that will ensure it is a sustainable community organisation going forward.  We have been reviewing the use of our 20+ A listed buildings to ensure they are fit for purpose and revenue earning where possible.   ASH was first rebuilt in 1990 as a hostel type accomodation for groups with additional needs.  It was only used for a few weeks in the summer months and was a big overhead for the charity.  MBH had been used to house the exhibition/museum although was built as a multi purpose hall.  The harbour stands strong against the incredible tides and weather and is a great place to view sealife and birds.  The community were clear that business should be a priority at Hynish and 84% said that they wanted a restaurant, quality accomodation and an event space all year round; they also wanted the harbour to be preserved.  We have piloted the restaurant and rooms over the past 2 years and now believe that it can work if we have a good standard of accomodation to offer and a multi purpose space for events.  We have also moved the exhbition to another building to free up Morton Boyd Hall for this purpose.  We will work with community groups to put on a variety of events and functions throughout the year.  We will also be able to provide permanent employment for locals.
3. We can see from our pilot that our community is positive about the fact we have a local family working at ASH and have created year round employment for locals.  We have trialled a number of community events over last winter and they proved to be popular.  The Tiree people love the shore station and feel a strong sense of guardianship.  The pilot has also showed us that we can create a reasonable income stream from this.  We now have facts and figures to base our projections on which gives us confidence that this is the right way forward.  All the buildings at Hynish need to work and complement each other to ensure the "place" is kept in alignment.  The pilot has demonstrated that the restaurant/rooms/bar and events do contribute greatly to this.  The project would enhance the employment opportunities; keep a family with 3 children living on Tiree; provide the much needed income stream to ensure sustainability; reduce running costs; make the buildings all more energy efficient and in line with our aim to lower the carbon footprint and provice a place for people and businesses to flourish.
4. The project will start early in 2026 and be completed by November 2026.

• £ Capital
• Arts
• Culture & Heritage
• Community Assets
• Employment
• Training & Volunteering
• Islands
• Regeneration
• Sport & Leisure
• Tourism

• Oban Lorn and the Isles