Cuimhneachain Bhreacais 2025

Strùpag ‘s Sgeulachdan:- Bùthan Bhreacais at Talla Bhreacais, 22.11.25

The Talla Bhreacais @100 project launched officially in June of this year, with the first of our Strùpag ‘s Sgeulachdan events at Talla Bhreacais. We had a pop up exhibition, curated by Ronan Martin, with various themes such as crofting, place names, archeology, music and written word.

We were delighted to see so many people come out on a Monday night, and there was a real buzz about the work.

Our second Strùpag ‘s Sgeulachdan event in September focused on Talla Bhreacais itself and people’s memories of the hall. As well as sharing memories verbally, we invited people to draw their first memory of the hall, and some lovely artwork was created. It has been brilliant to speak to people of all ages who live in Breakish and folks who have been to the hall over the years and to hear or see what the hall means to them.

At these events, Ronan has been scanning photos and documents and conducting informal interviews with people. We know that sometimes these events have been busy and not everyone has had the opportunity to speak to Ronan. We are sorry to anyone who hasn’t yet had the opportunity to speak with him, but if you would like to be interviewed in the future or if you have photos to share please contact us.

The Strùpag ‘s Sgeulachdan events are a way of sparking memories, stories and conversations between people.  All the information gathered is being added to a growing archive, some of which will be used for an exhibition, planned for early 2027.

We held our first centenary ceilidh in September, which was attended by around seventy people of all ages.  There was music by the Breakish Ceilidh Band for dancing, performances by various local musicians & singers including Kirsteen Graham, Deirdre Graham, Harta, Ronan Martin & Frances Wilkins and Iseabail & Ester Strachan. We also enjoyed a song by Ada Martin, Lucy Bee and Evie Bentall who are all pupils at Broadford Primary School. Our Fear an Taighe was Ruairidh Graham, who did a brilliant job throughout the evening introducing all the performers in Gaelic and English. We had a smaller pop-up exhibition at the back of the hall for people to browse and find out more about the work.

November saw our third Strùpag ‘s Sgeulachdan on Bùthan Bhreacais (the shops of Breakish), and again the hall was buzzing with stories and enthusiasm as folks browsed through photos, maps and memorobilia from shops in the village from past to present.

Earlier this month, we held a local song workshop: Seinn Còmhla - Òrain à Breacais, with local singer and artist Kirsteen Ghreumach. The Seinn Còmhla group meets monthly in the hall and provides a space where Gaelic is spoken throughout. Its members were delighted to learn these songs from Breakish, to talk about them and to welcome people to the group who had not previously attended.  Thank you to Kirsteen for researching the songs and poems from Breakish and teaching them to all twenty two of us.

We are currently planning two events at the beginning of 2026:- a ceilidh celebrating the Old New Year on Saturday 17th January, and a Strùpag ‘s Sgeulachdan - Muir is Tìr | Land & Sea on Saturday 31st January. Please see our events page for full details.

Over the coming months, we will be planning the exhibition for the hall and we look forward to sharing more information about that as things progress.

We would like to thank everyone who has come to our events, contributed stories and photos, and to all who have donated to support the work.  If you haven’t made it along to any of our events yet, we hope to see you in 2026!

We would also like to thank our funders Bòrd na Gàidhlig, The National Lottery Community Fund and the Bùdhmòr Fund.

Nollaig Chridheil agus Bliadhna Mhath Ùr dhuibh uile!

Iseabail, Lis, Ronan, Frances is Kirsteen

Sgrioba Cuimhneachain Bhreacais