A local institution

Backblip because mood

I needed to dispose of great quantities of prunings, so with Mum and Dad we had a jolly trip to the tip, followed by coffee-and-a-bun at the Storehouse cafe in Penicuik.  I saw my friend Pippa there but she was in and out in a trice and I didn't have a chance to say hello.

While walking there I snapped this fussy but grand building called The Cowan Institute.  Built in 1893 by papermaking magnate Alexander Cowan, it was designed as a community hub with a grand hall, reading rooms and library, a museum, a gymnasium and bathing facilities.  I thought the clock looked somehow familiar: it is a copy of the clock that hung outside the Canongate Tolbooth in Edinburgh, when Cowan lived opposite.  In 1963 the building became Penicuik Town Hall, although it only performed in this role for 12 years.  In 2021 it was fully restored and is back to being a community hub.