Our brands and brand licensing

Historic Environment Scotland is the main brand in a brand family which represents our wide ranging of work, iconic visitor attractions and extensive archives. You can read a summary of our brands on this page, and find out how to contact our retail team to discuss licensing programmes.

Historic Environment Scotland was created in 2015, bringing together the work of two organisations: Historic Scotland and the Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Scotland (RCAHMS).

Our logo is based on the concept of a keystone. These are found across the built historic environment which is seen as a symbol of strength and stability. They bring elements together to create a coherent whole.

The Historic Scotland brand covers everything to do with visiting or experiencing the amazing historic places we look after.

You'll see the distinctive Historic Scotland logos on brown signs pointing the way to hundreds of castles, palaces, abbeys and ancient monuments nationwide. It also appears in our guidebooks, leaflets, interpretation panels and on the Historic Scotland app.

Our memberships also operate under this brand, so if you sign up to support our work, you'll become a valued member of Historic Scotland.

We have dedicated sub-brands for our two most popular visitor attractions.

Edinburgh Castle is one of the most exciting historic sites in Europe. Set in the heart of Scotland’s capital, it is packed with historic stories from a rich and turbulent past. Home to the Honours of Scotland and star of many films and TV shows, it is visited daily by thousands of visitors from all over the world.

Stirling Castle sits on a volcanic crag that dominates the skyline for miles around. Scottish monarchs enlarged, developed and embellished the castle, which was the childhood home of Mary, Queen of Scots. We've recreated the interiors as they might have looked in the reign of James V.

Based in the heart of Stirling, The Engine Shed is Scotland’s dedicated building conservation centre. Its aim is to ensure Scotland's built heritage should be explored, understood and looked after for future generations. 

It's a hub of digital innovation, training and heritage science, home to specialist labs and host to many events and conferences where experts share technical knowledge to support Scotland’s skills needs.

Go to the Engine Shed website

trove.scot is a digital platform which brings together our wealth of unique and diverse collections in one convenient place. Everyone can use trove.scot as a tool to explore every corner of Scotland through archive images, listed building records, archaeological information and more.

The platform combines information from our Historic Environment Portal and Property in Care Collections, as well as two of our former sub-brands: Canmore and SCRAN.

Explore trove.scot

The National Collection of Aerial Photography (NCAP) is one of the largest collections of aerial imagery in the world, containing tens of millions of images featuring historic events and places.

A team of dedicated technicians, historians, analysts, cataloguers, data managers (and robots!) deliver these important collections to the public every day, as well as working to  preserve them and make them accessible for present and future generations.

Historic Environment Scotland Enterprises (HESe) manages the licensing programme for our brands. Each programme closely reflects our values, with royalties from products sold contributing to the work we do to investigate, care for and promote our historic environment.

The sale of a licensed product could help us to care for historic places and collections across Scotland, support traditional skills and learning initiatives and carry out research into key issues affecting our heritage, like the impact of climate change.

If you are interested in working with us and licensing our brands, please contact shop@hes.scot for more information.