MARGARET CHRYSTALL: The loss of the Ironworks is devastating – but maybe its time now to plan what comes next

Guess we are all reeling at the decision that came from Highland Council today about the Ironworks Venue – it will be replaced by a hotel.

The circumstances mean it might have seemed inevitable for a while. But that doesn't lessen the blow and seems a tragic end to perhaps one of the most life-changing buildings Inverness benefited from – for young people in particular – but also all the thousands of music-lovers of all ages who have flocked there over the years.

It seems particularly hard that this building is custom-built for music – for audiences and the musicians who bring in their gear and have comfortable backstage areas (not always the case) as well as a great stage and capacity for a number of people that became a game-changer for the level of bands Inverness was able to attract. There have been so many unforgettable nights there and the chance to witness talents that might have missed our city off their tour, if the Ironworks hadn't existed.

The Ironworks made this city somewhere that teens could start their music experiences with some of the biggest and best acts this country and others could offer.

And, I feel, it may have been an important factor in attracting back people in their twenties who had left for bigger cities and their metropolitan attractions to study, but felt that there was so much going on up in this North hub city of ours that they would consider returning to build their lives here. The Ironworks was surely a key jigsaw piece in any such decision.

There are many other places to hear music, maybe – most smaller, none with the feel of a proper home for music which the Ironworks has.

And it seems ironic that in an area that is one of the most blessed in terms of the natural music talent that thrives here, that there will no longer be this venue that treats that with all the respect and sense of importance it should have.

It would be good to think that there might be a phoenix to rise from these flames – a new building, a new idea even that could investigate new spaces, a neglected building that might with some imagination and a lot of investment and ingenuity, become an alternative.

But these are difficult times. It would take a lot of money, an incredible vision and an almost superhuman amount of faith to get something like that off the ground.

Hopefully that might be out there –- and I would love to believe it will happen.

At the moment, I just feel incredibly sad.

Now it's a time for mourning, but maybe we need to be planning and pushing for what comes next.

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