Always on
This project successfully funded on 20th December 2025, you can still support them with a donation.
Prototyping Affordable Housing Solutions for Arran
Isle of Arran, United Kingdom
Aim
Raising £3,500 to complete cladding on my affordable housing prototype in Arran, offering my late father's original prints as thank-you gift
Prototyping Affordable Housing Solutions for Arran
Arran's housing crisis is pricing out young people and essential workers. I'm building a prototype to live in and to show what's possible - a compact, sustainable timber dwelling that could provide genuinely affordable homes for those locked out of the market.
Designed by Toni Pörtner, this low-impact dwelling demonstrates innovative approaches we're developing through Dùthchas Arainn CBS and the Arran Pioneer Project CIC. The design principles will inform our woodland crofting work, showing how we can create homes that are both affordable and sustainable.
Please note: This is personal cause fundraising. Your donations will go directly to me to complete my home, not to any charitable organisation.
My Story
Having grown up in Arran and seen people leave because they can't afford to stay, this matters deeply to me. I know what housing insecurity feels like. When I was young, my family couldn't finish building our home in Whiting Bay and we had to move to Glen Place in Brodick.
What I Need
30 years later and I need £3,500 for timber cladding to rainproof my house. As thank-you gifts for supporters, I'm offering a selection of my late father's original prints featuring Arran's landscapes, birds, fauna and flora. Stephen Gill was a renowned local printmaker who spent decades capturing the landscapes he loved to walk. You can read more about him on The Arran Arts Heritage Trail: https://www.arranartsheritagetrail.com/artistsa-z/gill%2C-stephen
If we raise more than £3,500: Additional funds will support completion costs for the house or go towards our woodland crofting project and fruit tree planting.
The Timeline
The house will be complete by March 2026 - ten years after Dad passed away. Using his art to finish my home feels like the right way to honour his work while completing something that matters to both of us.
His work reflects why I want to live in the island where I grew up, for it's natural beauty, its trees and wildlife, and to dedicate my career towards natural conservation and woodland crofting and regeneration.
Current status of house before cladding, with membrane:
Funding method
Keep what you raise – this project will receive all pledges made