By Ian McConnell
The former MacKinnon Country House Hotel on the Isle of Skye has been acquired by the Fusion Group hospitality business for a price believed to be around £750,000.
The historic property, set in nearly five acres of grounds at Kyleakin, will continue to be run as a hospitality venture. It is being rebranded as The Isle of Skye Guest House. Subject to planning permission, Fusion intends to develop part of the house grounds into a “modern lodge park”. It proposes 34, two-bedroom lodges for let, alongside a custom-built “club house”.
Built in 1912 by Major Archie MacKinnon, the house is overlooked by the Sgurr na Coinnich mountain range, and is one of the first stop-off points after the Skye Bridge. The property has nine en-suite bedrooms in the main guest house. A further six, also all en-suite, are in a separate garden lodge. A spokeswoman said the seller is a “private family”.
READ MORE: Scotland ferries: Caledonian MacBrayne should be treated as national treasure: Ian McConnell
Alex McKie, group managing director of Fusion Group, said: “We’re pleased and delighted to announce this significant acquisition of MacKinnon House on Skye. It marks an exciting time as we emerge from one of the most challenging times for our sector, but I have to say we as a group are coming out of it stronger, more diverse and in a position to positively disrupt the market.
“There’s more in the pipeline too.”
He added: “Skye has enjoyed even greater popularity as a UK staycation destination over the Covid-19 pandemic, being on many a bucket list as a place to visit. We look forward to capitalising on this continuing trend in the coming months, and, indeed, plan to add further value to the offering at The Isle of Skye Guest House by developing a lodge park to attract more self-catering guests.”
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here