A north-east community group hopes it can transform a forgotten town hall into a fully fledged heritage centre.
The Strichen Community Park group took over the High Street hall earlier this year after Aberdeenshire Council announced it was surplus to its requirements.
And since then, it has forged forward with plans alongside the Buchan Heritage Society to bring the prominent building back into use.
Last night, Strichen Community Park director Hebbie Fowlie announced that the goal was to secure the history of the village within its walls.
His group formed a sub-committee to take over the running of the hall at a time when it was believed it would be floated on the open market.
The group has now started work to get the building’s clock tower ringing once more.
Mr Fowlie said: “It’ll take a few years to do everything up, but to get people interested we’ve managed to raise a bit of funding to repair the clock faces on the outside.
“We’ll get them back in use and the next plan will be getting its bell ringing again.
“Ultimately we want to make it a heritage centre – a place where all the local history can be kept. We have a lot of it here with the old businesses and we believe there is a need.”
Buchan Heritage Society is helping to that end.
Mr Fowlie, who also runs the village’s historic butchers, added: “If we hadn’t taken it over, the council could have sold it and we don’t know what could have happened.
“But now we’ve got a company drawing up revised plans for the building, and hopefully we’ll get an extension onto the side of it for disabled access.
“It’s quite a project and it’ll be good for the village.”
To help raise funds to complete the ambitious project, the group will host a ceilidh on Friday.
Tickets to the event, which will take place at the Ritchie Hall from 8pm, are priced at £10 and available at Bert Fowlie Butchers or through the Buchan Heritage Society Facebook page.
