Dundee City Chambers
Opening up Dundee City Chambers to the public
Helen's commitment to transparency and accessibility transformed the office of Lord Provost, making it more open and less formal. Actively engaging with the public in her usual warm and relaxed manner, Helen's invitation for people to visit Dundee City Chambers was a widely hailed as a success; her open and welcoming manner fostered a sense of inclusion and removed the secrecy and exclusive nature of the office. As Helen would always tell people, this is your city chambers - not mine.
The Five-bob tour!
Helen arranged for Dundee City Chambers to be accessible to all members of the public. The tours, affectionately labelled
by staff as the "five-bob tours" (a five shilling tour in earlier days was regarded as quite a treat - much better than a one shilling tour!), were an outstanding success.
Helen included her own office in the visits to let people see where she worked, and always tried to be there to meet people
personally. Officers of the council enjoyed explaining the history of
Dundee Chambers, the City's office bearers, the
historical regalia and many more areas of interest and Helen commissioned a booklet to be given out that covered the areas discussed
during the tours. Here are some of the pages from this
publication, "City of Dundee Scotland - A Chronicle of The City's Office Bearers, Chambers, Regalia, Castles and Twin Cities":
List of Provosts and Lord Provosts of Dundee
The final entry in the list of
Provosts and Lord Provosts of
Dundee in
the page shown above is Helen
Wright who opened up the
chambers to the public and
commissioned this booklet. In a
list that started in the year
1286, Helen Wright is the first
woman to become
Lord Provost. Today, in 2025, Helen remains the only woman to have held the position of Lord Provost and Lord Lieutenant of Dundee. All pages of this brochure, A Chronicle of The City's Office Bearers, Chambers, Regalia, Castles and Twin Cities, can be viewed by following the links below (the pages will open in a new window):
Page 1 Front Page
Page 2 Contents
Page 3 The City Sqaure
Page 4 The City Sqaure (cont.)
Page 5 The Council Chambers
Page 6 The Council Chambers (cont.)
Page 7 The Council Chambers (cont.)
Page 8 Dundee's Ensign Armorial
Page 9 Dundee's Ensign Armorial (cont.)
Page 10 Dundee's Castles
Page 11 Dundee's Castles (cont.)
Page 12 The Lord Provost's Chain of Office
Page 13 History of the title "Lord Provost"
Page 14 History of the title "Lord Provost" (cont.)
Page 15 The Civic Mace
Page 16 Twin Cities
Page 17 Twin Cities (cont.)
Page 18 Chronological list of Baillies, Provosts and Lord Provosts
Page 19 Chronological list of Baillies, Provosts and Lord Provosts (cont.)
from the City Chambers to St Marys Church.
... further information and photographs will appear here soon. Helen's work with Dundee's twin cities of Wurzburg, Alexandria, Orleans, Zadar and Nablus, mentioned in the booklet, will be covered in her forthcoming publication and on this website.
