Campaigners from the Friends of Hopetoun Crescent Garden are calling for funding to move an 18th century cottage from Edinburgh's Leith Walk to the Royal Botanic Gardens.

The Botanic Cottage which lies between Annandale Street and MacDonald Road, the site of the city's original Botanic Gardens, is due to be demolished in September to make way for a hotel.

Although the campaigners have gained a £48,500 Heritage Lottery grant to research the building's past, more cash is needed to dismantle and re-erect it.

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The cottage has been empty for almost three years and was most recently used as premises for a car hire firm.

The Friends of Hopetoun Crescent Garden will work with the Cockburn Conservation Trust and developers Drumkeen, to preserve evidence such as fragments of wallpaper and other archaeological finds from the cottage and make the information available to local communities and schools. They hope the research will lead to further funding.

Elieen Dickie, secretary of the project, said: "It is really exciting that the house will be looked at by professional archaeologists and researchers and secrets will be unearthed for all to see."

(GK/JM)