Your gateway to the life and the history of the Royal Burgh of Irvine, Ayrshire, Scotland

Walking Tour of Irvine ::: Irvine Burns Club ::: the Marymass Festival
North Ayrshire Citizens Advice Service (NACAS) ::: Parish Church windows
Harbour Arts Centre history ::: St Michael's Academy ::: other Irvines :::
Accommodation
Our new map of Irvine (with parking, supermarkets, toilets, station, & Annfield & Menzies Hotels)
Your organisation or club could have a section on this site - at minimum work and low cost - email us at the address below to discuss - irvineayrshire exists to serve our community.
Planned additions to this site include photographs of old and present-day Irvine.
GLANCE AT OUR LIVE MAP OF CURRENT WEBSITE VISITORS

crest of Irvine Royal Burgh

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Irvine, Scotland, created a Royal Burgh in 1372 by Robert II, was a major West of Scotland seaport before the dredging of the Clyde. In the 18th c., it was the largest burgh in Ayrshire (1775: pop. 3000). Today, Irvine hosts part of the Scottish Maritime Museum, the HQ of North Ayrshire Council, Ardagh (Rockware Glass) and NACCO (fork-lift trucks). The town enjoys a vibrant community spirit (with active Burns Club, Trades Guilds incorporated in 1646), and a week-long Marymass Festival in August. Robert Burns worked here for about six months in 1781-82. Irvine's burgh status ended in 1975 with local government reorganisation. Today the population of Irvine is 22,000. Apart from Irvine Scotland, there are other towns named Irvine. This site also contains the story of the volunteer-led years of the Harbour Arts Centre (1965-2007), details of the town walking tour, and the 86-year history of the now-demolished St Michael's Academy in Irvine and Kilwinning (1921-2007). Other items are added from time to time.

map of Scotland


Irvine Burns Club

Irvine walking tour

St Michael's Academy 1921-2007

Irvine & Kilwinning & Malawi

Parish Church windows   |   Harbour Arts Centre

links page   |  Irvine and the screw propeller

Within this site . . .

Irvine harbour scenes

Irvine Burns Club - established 1826
- extra web items every month
Marymass Festival and the Irvine Carters Society

photo: Irvine harbour - the Maritime Museum pontoons with the dome of The Big Idea Inventor Centre (now closed) in the background - and a harbour sunset (photos I J Dickson)

a few extra history pages: Town and Gown | Places of Burns interest | Old Parish Church windows
This site is sponsored by Vindogara Software
-- Vindogara was a town in this area in Roman times, named by the geographer Ptolemy (2nd c. AD) --

This site hosts two Irvine organisations (a) Irvine Burns Club, celebrating Robert Burns, and (b) Irvine Carters Society, who (with North Ayrshire Council) organise the annual Marymass Festival. Many people get a mention on this site - Pittendrigh Macgillivray, sculptor of the Robert Burns statue in Irvine, John Galt, the novelist, David Sillar, friend of Burns, William Motherwell, the Paisley poet and journalist, William Tennant, the distinguished linguist, and A J Balfour (Viscount Traprain), to name but a few out of perhaps three hundred. We add new material regularly, with the result that on each return visit you should always find something new. We also include a good selection of links to sites within and outwith Scotland.

Our new map of Irvine

Click here for a handy-to-print PDF version

You may print copies - on the sole condition that the copyright notice at its foot is not removed.

map of Irvine

"At the northern boundary, the Irvine, which too has a bridge of four arches, divides it from Cunningham.

At the mouth of the River Irvine is positioned the burgh of Irvine with a harbour so enclosed by sandbanks and with so little depth that it can take only smaller ships."

(Blaue Atlas, 1654 - see http://www.nls.uk/digitallibrary/map/early/blaeu/938.html)

 

 

NACAS - the North Ayrshire Citizens Advice Bureau - is an independent advice service, able to draw on wider resources through membership of Citizens Advice Scotland (CAS) and also contributing to the development of national policies through Citizens Advice Scotland.

 

 

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click here for websites of other Ayrshire towns