Making a Name for Yourself
In the past week I've had two conversations about the name of the gallery: "What does it mean?" and "how do you say it?" And as I've lost count the number of times over the past seven years I've answered both of those, I thought I'd put it the record straight - and share some photos of the Byre coming into being.

Byre is a Scottish - and old English - word for cowshed. As I'm Scottish it was a word I had heard all my life and it never occurred to me that not everyone would know what it meant - or even know how to pronounce it. So, if you've always wondered - here it is: it's pronounced to rhyme with 'desire' not 'fir' or 'fur' or some other even stranger variants.
I chose the name for two reasons: the gallery, and our house to which it is attached, were built on the site of old barns on a hilly slope on the edge of the village. We decided to call the house 'Hillside' but I wanted to give the gallery a separate identity.

The way we were - summer 2010
This part of the building was once used to keep cows so it seemed a really appropriate choice, to recognise it's agricultural heritage; and as I'm Scottish, I thought 'byre' sounded a bit prettier than cowshed.





