Why we must save the Palette

You may not have heard of Edinburgh Palette - but it is a place we should cherish.

St Margaret's House, Meadowbank, the home of Edinburgh Palette

For the last 10 years this unique charity has been beavering away quietly behind the unassuming facade of St Margaret’s House in Meadowbank. Many of you will know it as the red brick building with the big Art sign on its wall. Inside, a string of community groups and charities work work alongside artists and craftspeople. It is a community in its own right where everyone helps out each other, building networks that benefit thousands of people.

The future of Edinburgh Palette is precarious to say the least after The Drum Property Group paid £15 million for the building to turn it into student flats and affordable homes, along with, it says, facilities “for the benefit of the community”. It would be hard to find any one who fits that description better than Edinburgh Palette.

It would be wrong to expect the new owners to subsidise the charity indefinitely. But it would be worse for the charity to be turfed out without finding suitable alternative accommodation, whether at Meadowbank or elsewhere. Today we appeal to The Drum Group to help make that happen.