A science festival has a radical role in developing a creative climate for a region. Here is the story of how it began, and how Orkney was involved from an early stage in the concept.

It all really started in Edinburgh in the late 1980s. The city had been going through a period of stagnation, typified by derelict land or deserted buildings which had been earmarked for developments for which the City Council had no money.

In the late 1980s an energetic team developed in the City Council's Economic Development Department under the leadership of Bill Ross. Bill had come from handling property for British Rail, and to him a piece of derelict land was not a problem, but an opportunity. In the case of local authorities, it was an opportunity for partnerships with the private sector, to access the necessary investment.

The extent of the challenge they faced was brought home when Glasgow began to cash in on the results of all its own redevelopment work. 'Glasgow's Miles Better' was the slogan – beautifully concise and with a slight touch of ambiguity.

By the late 1980s it was clear that Glasgow was forging miles ahead in several areas. It was successful in hosting the 1988 Garden Festival, and then it hooked the big one – European Capital of Culture for 1990.

This really stung in Edinburgh, which had with its great tradition in art and architecture and literature regarded itself as the encapsulation of Scotland's culture. But by now its Economic Development Department was in full cry, tackling the problem of derelict sites and turning them into new areas of opportunity, which shortly would become the South Gyle retail and technology park, the finance centre, the conference centre and much else. The work was being carried out by a team led by Ian Wall, and Ian's approach to Glasgow's success in the field of culture was to seek a positive and innovative reply.

And that reply was quite brilliant. Instead of trying to counter on the cultural ground which Glasgow had so positively developed, Ian proposed that Edinburgh redevelop its image in the same way that it was redeveloping its derelict land. He came up with a new image for the city – a City of Science.

This was superb thinking, because the new image drew on all the strengths of the old one but developed it further into the future. Edinburgh's credentials as a City of Science were rooted in the past, in the great thinkers of the Scottish Enlightenment, enhanced by the mass of research institutions and university departments across the city today.

And how should the new image of the City of Science best be put across? Ian again had a visionary answer. Edinburgh's older cultural image was typified worldwide by the Edinburgh Festival, taking place in the autumnal shoulder of the tourist season. So the new image of the City of Science should be exemplified by – a Science Festival at the spring shoulder of the year.

And that was how the city of Edinburgh held the world's first-ever science festival in April 1989.

One of the people watching Edinburgh's progress most keenly was Orkney Tourist Board's Chief Executive, Josh Gourlay. He had noticed how the Isle of Man had built up a massive all-the-year-round tourist industry through a portfolio of festivals, and decided that Orkney, with its wealth of history and culture and environment, had the potential to do the same.

So Josh gave strong support to the first St Magnus Festival in 1978, and then was a founder-member of the group which created the Orkney Folk Festival. With a keen interest himself in science and particularly astronomy, he was determined that Orkney should move fast in the wake of Edinburgh's success.

And so one of the first regions in the world to take up the new concept was Orkney in 1991.

It was in a way a coming home for the Science Festival concept, as the whole format for it in Edinburgh had been created by Orcadian Howie Firth, who had built into the idea numerous memories of festival activities in his home islands.

'A science festival is first and foremost a festival,' he says. 'Up till then, science had been something that was good for you, and science events were aimed at scientists and people who were already interested. By contrast a festival was something for the whole community to enjoy, something fresh and creative, with surprises and excitement and sheer enjoyment.

'Orkney has a tradition of such events, in community concerts and gala weeks, in which everyone joins in and enriches the event in their own way. The challenge was to find ways to bring that atmosphere to Edinburgh, which has a rather more staid tradition of public events.

'So in the first Edinburgh Science Festival, for instance, we had a talk by Caroline Wickham-Jones at the Royal Botanic Gardens about her excavations on the island of Rum and the herbs she had found. We then had a sample of ancient beer, prepared in advance by Professor Geoffrey Palmer of Heriot-Watt University, accompanied by Orkney oatcakes and cheese.

'Seeing the way in which the Edinburgh audience cheerfully relaxed and enjoyed the beer and the food and the discussion, it was clear that we had confirmed the concept. And it's great to see how it has now spread around the world.'

Another source of information about the latest ideas on science communication in the UK is the British Council's Talking Science website at www.britishcouncil.org/talkingscience.htm