Blackhouse, Highland Folk Museum

Blackhouse, Highland Folk Museum

ID: KIGHF_HFM_MURRON_002 DESCRIPTION: “The Blackhouse gives a glimpse into the hard life of a Highlander. I knew I was photographing something that's pretty much in my DNA. It's a gift being able to step into this building; there are too few left”, Murron Ferguson, photographer, 2021. The Blackhouse at the Highland Folk Museum is based on the traditional style of house that was found on the northwest coast of the Highlands and the Western Isles. Blackhouses like this were lived in for hundreds of years, in rare occasions even up to the 1960s. It has thick stone walls for insulation against the weather, and a roof thatched with marram grass. The stone steps on the outside of the wall allowed easy access to maintain the roof, which needed to be re-thatched regularly. Inside the building to the left is the byre, where the cattle were housed during the winter months. The central room was the heart of the home where most of the indoor life took place, with the open hearth for cooking over, chairs and settles for gathering together, and box beds for sleeping. The “ben” or good room at the far end was usually used as a guest room or bedroom. This reconstruction of a blackhouse from the Isle of Lewis in the Outer Hebrides was one of the three houses that the founder of the Highland Folk Museum, Isabel F. Grant, had built in the 1940s when the Museum was in Kingussie. In 2013 the building was taken apart, stone by stone, and relocated to the Newtonmore site. The Blackhouse was photographed by Murron Ferguson of Inverness as part of the Folk and Fabric project which ran throughout 2021. In this project - funded by the Esmée Fairbairn Collections Fund – the Highland Folk Museum has created new ways to share a selection of the buildings and the collection online. The museum connected with community groups and individuals throughout the project, to provide opportunities to engage with the buildings and collections. Murron, a talented young photographer and filmmaker who has autism, used traditional black and white film photography to capture the five locations and highlight them to an online audience. Visit the Highland Folk Museum website to have a look around five of the historic buildings and find out more about the objects and stories they hold within PLACENAME: Highland Folk Museum DISTRICT: Badenoch OLD COUNTY/PARISH: INVERNESS: Kingussie and Insh CREATOR (AV): Murron Ferguson DATE OF IMAGE: July 2021 PERIOD: 2020s SOURCE: Highland Folk Museum COLLECTION: Murron Ferguson Asset ID: 48417 KEYWORDS: