Step inside The Standard
Enjoying the view from the top-floor flat balcony of The Standard are, left to right, director Bill Simon, interim executive director Kathryn Hill, treasurer Carol Hill and buildings manager David Hill
The Standard is a place that many will come to call home - and it flies the flag for an ambitious vision for the future.
Some of Midsteeple Quarter's volunteer directors have taken a first glimpse inside the building and a close look at its special exterior features too.
And they were delighted with what they saw, realising the community's vision for a place in the High Street where people not only work or visit, but live too.
The Standard represents a vision for better future for Dumfries town centre - one where people return to living on the upper floors of our buildings, with a vibrant range of uses in the floors below.
It is a model that - with time, patience, community support and innovation in funding, construction and all manner of other circumstances - Midsteeple Quarter hopes can be replicated in the other buildings that its members collectively own through the trailblazing community benefit society.
Midsteeple Quarter in the media: Read a BBC Scotland online feature on the completion of The Standard - and the hope it represents - by clicking here
The site on which it is built had become a derelict blot on the High Street. Now it is like no other building in the area.
Built with sustainability and energy efficiency at its core, it features a classy, striking frontage.
Along Standard Close, which has a sandstone-clad entrance as you enter from High Street and heading down to Irish Street, lettering in the brickwork points to the building's past as the historic home of the Dumfries & Galloway Standard - with The Standard being chosen as its name following a public poll earlier this year.
That too is reflected in a unique metalwork entrance to the seven flats which the site is now home to - many of them boasting majestic views across the Queen of the South from their balconies.
The homes - like the rest of the building - benefit from sustainability features including solar panels and air-source heating, which keep bills down while also helping the community’s journey towards net zero.
They provide flexible living spaces - for rent at mid-market rate - which meet known demand for homes of their kind.
Beneath them are areas which boast a wealth of opportunities.
A hot-desking and meeting space is unlike any other available in the town centre, with rooms looking out on to the High Street towards Great King Street.
And the ground-floor events, exhibition and workshop areas are flexible spaces which will provide a springboard to success for local enterprises and organisations of all kinds.
The completion of work at The Standard is a milestone moment both in the story of Midsteeple Quarter and in demonstrating the power of community ownership and action.
Midsteeple Quarter is incredibly grateful to its funders - the Scottish Government, South of Scotland Enterprise (SOSE), Dumfries and Galloway Council and the Holywood Trust - for their support in making the creation of this complex possible.
The society is also thankful for the project partners - along with their suppliers and sub-contractors - who have worked with them so positively during construction. Our main contractors were RH Irving Construction, with NIXON our project managers. ARPL has led our architectural work, with McGowan Miller working as quantity surveyors, alongside Asher Associates and FLN providing specialist mechanical and engineering support. South of Scotland Community Housing (SOSCH) supported us in so many ways in terms of creating - and then realising - our vision for community-led housing. Tenancies are now being managed by Homes For Good.
Anyone interested in using the community and enterprise spaces at The Standard can email enterprise manager Jakob Kaye - enterprise@midsteeplequarter.org.