Edinburgh's Fringe festival could be heading for another record year as one of its biggest venues has experienced a ticket sale rise of more than 40 per cent.
The Summerhall venue has now sold more than 56,000 tickets.
With other venues also registering increases on their ticket sales compared to 2014, the Edinburgh Festival Fringe could be poised to break the record of tickets set last year, when the festival issued 2.2m.
Summerhall, based in the former Dick Vet building near to the city's Meadows, stages a mix of theatre, music, performance art, and visual art.
Sam Gough, the general manager of Summerhall, said: "We are proud to host ongoing and exceptionally strong collaborative partnerships with Northern Stage, Paines Plough, The Place, companies from the UK and round the world with whom we work in collaboration and our own year round Nothing Ever Happens Here music programme.
"NEHH has seen sold out festival crowds for Sun Kil Moon, The Vaselines, Sun Ra, Orkestra Del Sol, Aidan Moffat and Bill Wells. Nothing Ever Happens Here continues into September and year round."
There have also been a record number of international artists, directors, producers and agencies attending the behind-the-scenes talent network at the festivals this year.
The project, run by festivals umbrella body Festivals Edinburgh, the British Council and Creative Scotland, invites artistic delegates from the around the world to Edinburgh to meet, do business, and plan productions for the future.
The programme, called Momentum, has this year hosted a record 123 delegates from countries including Brazil, Colombia, Argentina, Canada, South Korea, Taiwan, New Zealand, India, Iran, US and Japan.
Delegates in the city are visiting from South Korea, Japan, Taiwan and Iran for the first time.
The Fringe has another week to run and its organising Society has its annual general meeting on Tuesday.
Yesterday Edinburgh City Council said it is shaking up the use of one of the main Fringe venues, the Assembly Rooms.
Instead of the venue, in George Street, being booked by one Fringe operator, the council is to open it up to bids from a variety of festival organisers, promoters and theatrical or comedy producers.
The Assembly Rooms re-opened in 2012 following a £9.2m refurbishment, which also saw the departure of its long term tenant, Assembly Festival.
Salt'n'Sauce Promotions and The Stand currently operates the venue during the festival.
Now the council's management team is seeking interested parties who want to use the venue's "large multi-purpose spaces."
Shona Clelland, general manager of Assembly Rooms Edinburgh, said: "Edinburgh is a vibrant city all year round, but in August with the influx of festival visitors and performers from all over the world.
"Performances are held in everything from an elevator right up to traditional theatres, and venue space is at a premium as a result.
"We have amazing flexible spaces and we want to talk to producers who have new ideas and cutting edge thinking for different uses, or mix of uses, at this commercial and creative time of the year.
"Assembly Rooms has a key role to play at the heart of the festivals, and we are keen to partner with organisations to maximise the potential of our inspiring venue."
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