Hopetoun House Step Building Project, South Queensferry, Edinburgh
The site
Hopetoun House is owned and managed by an independent, charitable trust created in 1974 by the current Marquess and his father in order to preserve the House with its historic contents and surrounding landscape for the enjoyment and education of the public for all time. While it is the house that is the most recognisable ‘face’ of the estate, the grounds offer a great deal to the public – both local people and visitors from elsewhere. Hopetoun has over 150 acres of land, which includes grazing land, woodland, a deer park and a number of miles of seashore. As such, the estate has a great deal of biodiversity and environmental value, and appropriate management of this asset for the benefit of current and future generations takes a great deal of input.
The project
A series of steps currently leads down from one of the public paths through the grounds of Hopetoun House to the seashore. The existing steps are aged and beginning to become unsafe and so require replacement. Hopetoun House would like to put in a new set of steps as part of their plan to open up access to the seashore for members of the public. The project involves the removal of these 27 steps and their replacement with new steps made from railway sleepers. This is a good team-building project, requiring the group to work together in an organized way to achieve a high quality end result. To replace all of the steps would take a group of 10-15 people 2 days to complete, or a large group of 25-30 people 1 day to complete. As such, this project may suit the larger team challenge group. Alternatively, the project could be split in two parts, allowing two separate teams to each complete a series of 13-14 steps.
As part of the project, Hopetoun House would like to offer a free tour of the house as a token of its appreciation for the work carried out by the group.
