UK AIDS Memorial Quilt

Open Wednesdays to Fridays 12pm to 5pm
Saturdays 12pm to 6pm
Sundays 12pm to 5pm

The UK AIDS Memorial Quilt comes to Tramway in autumn, its first ever display in Scotland. 

It will be exhibited alongside archival material which traces the Scottish roots of the project, as well as the documentary film There Is A Light That Never Goes Out. It is free to visit and will be open for three weeks from 12 - 27 September 2026.

The UK AIDS Memorial Quilt consists of 42 quilts and 23 individual panels, representing over 384 individuals affected by HIV and AIDS. It is part of the world’s largest community art project, started in the USA in 1985 by activist Cleve Jones, commemorating friends, family and loved ones lost to AIDS. Individual panels were stitched together to create larger quilts, which were then shown outdoors as a form of protest to raise awareness about HIV and AIDS.

In the late 1980s, Scottish activist Alastair Hume visited San Francisco, where he witnessed an early display of the quilt. When Hume returned home to Edinburgh, he began coordinating the creation and display of a UK version, as many others did around the world.

In 2014, seven UK HIV support charities formed the UK AIDS Memorial Quilt Partnership to conserve and display the quilt. Today it stands as an  important reminder of those who were lost and of the fact that HIV and AIDS continue to affect people and communities today. While antiretrovirals have made it possible to live with HIV, access to this medication still varies dramatically across the globe. 

The Tramway exhibition follows the display at the Turbine Hall of Tate Modern, in London, in June 2025, which was experienced by nearly 70,000 visitors over five days. As with the Turbine Hall, the Tramway display will include scheduled readings of the names of those commemorated in the Quilt. 

Read our press release (7 Dec 2025)

Image courtesy of Waverley Care