Braidwood, South Lanarkshire


Braidwood is a small village near Carluke, in South Lanarkshire, Scotland. The medieval barony of Braidwood included the Tower of Hallbar.
Braidwood House, former seat of Lord Clydesmuir, is one of the major local landmarks. Over the years it has been a home for sufferers of cerebral palsy run by Capability Scotland and is now home to the South of Scotland offices of the Forestry Commission. Braidwood House was also briefly home to the Airborne Initiative, formerly of Glengonnar outside Abington, who specialised in outward-bound style training for young offenders. However the Airborne's funding was subsequently withdrawn by the Scottish Executive, after the airing of a controversial BBC documentary Chancers.
Many houses have been built in Braidwood in the past couple of years, primarily on the former sites of the vehicle dismantlers of Alan Gray at Nellfield. The "Nellfield Garage" petrol station is still functioning along with a shop.

Education

The village has one primary school which is a feeder to Carluke High School, the school educates some pupils from the village and mostly incomers from Carluke. The architecture of the old school building is noteworthy as it was in the shape of an alien spacecraft. This building was rebuilt to create a larger school in 2014.

Location

The village itself is situated in the Clyde valley, around from the river Clyde.
For a small village it has a good variety of signposted woodland footpaths in the valley, with unusual names such as Fiddler's Gill, Open Streetmap>and an attractive village duck pond, much used for picnics.