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 600-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.