Why tourists could soon ditch Edinburgh for cool, historic Dundee
Dundee, the oldest, sunniest and fourth largest city in Scotland, has not always been on the tourist trail. But having experienced both boom and bust several times in its history, this friendly, compact city on the banks of the River Tay has a history of reinvention. Now, it is once again transforming itself – and could soon leave rivals Edinburgh and Glasgow in the dust.
The latest boom is the result of a raft of new openings and developments. The UK’s first (and only) Unesco City of Design, Dundee took a significant step into the limelight with the return of RRS Discovery, the ship that took Scott to the Antarctic, as well as providing a new home for HMS Unicorn, a 200-year-old Royal Navy ship – one of the oldest in the world. The regenerated waterfront has also welcomed the appropriately ship-shaped V&A Dundee, a museum of design, art and architecture which is the first iteration of the V&A outside London.
And then there’s the Eden Project Dundee, with its imaginative ambitions for an abandoned former gas works just along the waterfront from the V&A and Discovery. With ￡7.6 million of funding committed, it’s expected to bring 500,000 visitors a year to the city, drawing them with the promise of experiences which combine the arts, entertainment, learning and green space. It’ll incorporate the derelict gasometer, creating gardens within old walls and building a new pedestrian bridge which will link the city and the waterfront.
But it’s not all about the new – Dundee is repurposing its past, too. Said to have been built on “jam (marmalade), jute (mills) and journalism (newspapers and comics)”, the wealth generated by the so-called “Three Js” is still evident here, not least in the lavish high-Victorian Gothic architecture scattered throughout the small city centre, along with Art Deco iron-work you won’t see anywhere else in Scotland.
Visit the McManus – the city’s art gallery and museum – and you’ll find one of the finest examples of Gothic revival architecture anywhere in the UK; or wonder along to the meticulously restored Verdant Works – Scotland’s jute museum – where working machinery tells the stories of those who once worked in the jute and linen mills. There’s also J. A. Braithwaite on Castle Street, Dundee’s oldest tea and coffee shop (where the original mahogany shop fittings and scales are still in use), as well as Verdant Gin, the first (legal) distillery to open in the city for over 200 years, and a former ironworks that’s recently become home to the 71 Brewing Company’s beer garden, brewhouse and shop.
A compact place, Dundee’s size works to its advantage too – with plenty of interesting neighbourhoods (Perth Road’s boutique and retro shops, for example), appealing places to eat and drink, and offbeat gallery experiences (like modern-art spot Gallery 48 or Dundee Contemporary Arts) to build your itinerary around.
And there’s nature, too. Climb to the top of Dundee Law – the highest point in the city – for great views; go for a stroll in the riverside Botanic Gardens; or take the nine-minute train to Broughty Ferry, an attractive suburb of Victorian villas with a long sandy beach and 15th century castle.
However you approach the city, with the on-going regeneration of the waterfront and kudos of the Eden Project, Dundee’s profile looks set to carry on climbing – with all the quintessential elements of Dundonian life enduring yet. Goodfellow and Steven still makes Dundee fruitcakes; 86 years on, D.C. Thomson is still publishing The Beano; and you can still get a Scotch pie at any hour, day or night, at Clark’s Bakery. What more could any tourist ask?
Essentials
Hotel Indigo Dundee is a fun, stylish conversion of a former mill with an extraordinary Italianate tower (double rooms from ￡57; ihg.com); Malmaison Dundee, meanwhile, offers a taste of art deco (double rooms from ￡65; malmaison.com)
