Custom Lane is a place-led development company focused on nurturing community within the buildings it stewards. Based in Leith, Scotland, we operate three properties and work alongside industry colleagues to shape buildings and districts in ways that are thoughtful, context-driven and rooted in the life of the area.
Conceived by GRAS, Custom Lane is a collaborative platform created to identify, support and celebrate emerging world-class design in Scotland. At the heart of our organisation is collaboration. Whether you are based in our workspace, or hiring our multi-use exhibition and event space, we strive to work with you to extend opportunities and achieve the highest quality outcome across all projects.
Custom Lane is an evolving, collaborative experiment in creating the most engaging, enriching and enjoyable work environment for designers and design-led makers in Scotland. It has been incredibly exciting to watch a community grow around the seed of an idea and for residents take ownership of the concept and space, creating a thriving, productive culture.
Feminine Literacy, 2025
Photography by Stephen Lister
Feminine Literacy, 2025
Photography by Stephen Lister
We run both a core programme, curated by Custom Lane, and a partner programme of events and exhibitions. Our core programme showcases Scottish and international design across multiple disciplines, while our partner programme offers organisations and individuals the opportunity to work with our distinctive spaces.
Open and accessible to the public, the ground floor brings together a café, roastery, shop, gallery, event space, tattoo studio and barber studio, creating a lively, mixed-use setting at the heart of Custom Lane. Upstairs, our open-plan floor provides space dedicated to design and creative development.
Building Partners
Those who have partnered with us over the years have played an important role in shaping Custom Lane and its ongoing development.
Groves-Raines Architects Studios is a second-generation architecture, conservation and design practice based in Edinburgh.
Working across architecture, interiors, branding and objects, the studio brings together architects, researchers, designers and makers.
With projects shaped through careful stewardship and collaboration, GRAS approaches architecture as a cultural act, attentive to place, material, use and change over time.
www.gras.co
Williams & Johnson are a micro coffee roastery based in Leith who run their flagship café from Custom Lane.
www.williamsandjohnson.com
In Celtic cultures, a bard is a traveling storyteller and champion of noble deeds.
Bard is a shop and gallery for Scottish craft and design, based in Leith, Edinburgh, founded by husbands Hugo Macdonald and James Stevens. We tell stories about ideas, people and objects that forge Scottish cultural identity, past, present and future. Our mission is twofold: we believe that living with craft can ground and elevate our daily experience, at home and in society; we also believe that Scottish craft and design is ripe for a global audience. If it’s true that we are what we make, then we want to show the world that we are made of more than tartan shortbread tins.
www.bard-scotland.com
Scottish Historic Buildings Trust plays a unique role in preserving and promoting the nation’s heritage. The Trust collaborates with local communities and specialists to preserve significant properties at risk in Scotland. With a small team and no public funding we have already restored over 30 buildings and raised in excess of £30 million.
Our team has specialist skills in historic building preservation, fundraising, project management and property management. We also bring expertise in event management, building interpretation and in delivering educational programmes.
www.shbt.org.uk
Human Resources is a cross-disciplinary, independent micro-design studio based in Edinburgh, Scotland, working with clients world-wide.
Human Resources collaborate with clients, agencies and in-house teams to help realise their creative vision and communicate what they do to the world, translating ideas and purpose into meaningful, commercially right solution exploring the fields of arts and culture, fashion and retail, design, digital and new media.
www.instagram.com/humanresources_
KESTIN is a Scottish men’s clothing brand founded by Kestin Hare, and based in his hometown of Edinburgh, Scotland. Kestin the brand was created to redefine modern Scottish design by blending innovation with tradition. They weave in references from our heritage and homeland, combining integral details from other areas of inspiration including vintage, workwear, military, sports and outdoor. Their focus is on responsible manufacturing, sourcing the highest-quality fabrics and creating original products that are designed to last.
www.kestin.co
