Exhibition helps to connect with past

REMINDERS of wartime days could help people with dementia connect with the past at an innovative Angus centre.

Kirrie Connections opened in March last year with the aim of making Kirriemuir one of Scotland’s first “dementia friendly” communities.

Staff have been developing the Bank Street drop-in centre which now hosts a First World War exhibition about the Home Front.

The display has been staged in conjunction with Kirriemuir Heritage Trust, whose chairman Sandy Jamieson said: “We thought that by placing the exhibition in the centre it would be a talking point and stir memories among their dementia groups about their family members and people they had heard about serving in that war.

“The exhibition also shows old photographs, and that too could be another way of stimulating discussion.

“With the permission of Kirrie Connections’ management committee, we intend to open a memories room at the centre later this year.

“It will feature many photographs, newspaper accounts of Kirriemuir and district through the years.”

Kirrie Connections project coordinator Graham Galloway said: “It will allow displays for people of all ages to see the town develop through the ages, which can only have a positive effect in rekindling memories for visitors at the hub.”