An Ode to Wigtown

Every autumn, Scotland’s smallest county town becomes its biggest literary draw. Wigtown Book Festival returns from 25 September to 4 October 2026 with ten days of authors, ideas and a whole town taken over by book lovers. If you’ve never been, it’s worth the trip alone. If you have, we can’t blame you for coming back. While there are far too many worth mentioning, here is a very small collection of our favourite Wigtown bookshops, and festival highlights that have caught our eye. 

Reading Lasses on South Main Street is a bookshop dedicated to books by and about women, with a café “built for lingering”. Order a coffee, nab the seat by the window if you can, and plan for a wee bit more time than you think. Just a few doors along, you’ll find The Old Bank Bookshop, the former Customs House and Bank with five rooms to explore, each home to an impressive amount of second-hand music and books. Foggie Toddle Books is one for the kids, shelves squished full of favourites old and new, from board books for tots to young adult titles, and lots of local arts and crafts gifts to explore. 

And The Bookshop, Wigtown’s oldest and Scotland’s largest second-hand bookshop, is run by Shaun Bythell, author of Diaries of a Bookseller, and is well worth the visit. With an estimated 100,000 books atop a mile of shelving, you’re sure to find a book, or ten, to bring home. The programme opens on Friday 25 September with the traditional pipers’ procession through North Main Street at 8:45pm, fireworks over Wigtown Bay to follow. If you’re staying with us that night, it’s worth timing your evening around it. Saturday’s a full day. 

We’re loving the sound of Aimee MacDonald and Rebecca Ferrier taking on witches, time switches and ancient curses at midday, with a wander around the bookshops before joining Master Distiller Dr Nick Savage for a session tracing 200 years of Bladnoch Distillery’s history alongside a wee dram or two (over 18s only). And if poetry’s more your thing, catch Michael Mullen, Taylor Dyson and Mark Vernon Thomas for The Sunday Sessions at The Hub, an hour not to be missed. That’s just a handful from a packed ten days. Full programme and booking on the festival’s own site.

A top tip from us for a day spent in Wigtown is to always plan for longer than you think. Between the shops, the festival programme, and Wigtown’s own cafés, one day rarely feels like enough. And when the last talk has finished and your bag is heavier than it was that morning, we’d love to have you back at Barwhillanty. There’s something particularly lovely about a new book and an open fire, and our cottages are built for exactly that, and Dumfries and Galloway rarely looks better than it does from a window seat in October.