It is curtains for Inverness Town House

Inverness Provost Helen Carmichael and wrapped up Inverness Town House

The front of Historic Inverness Town House has been hidden behind specialist material decorated with a full-size image of the building's frontage.

Highland Council asked for the wrapping to help cover unsightly scaffolding while work is carried out on the building.

Work started earlier this year on the three-phase, three-year maintenance project costing £4.2m.

The repairs had previously been estimated to run to more than £7m.

The scaffolding is expected to be in place for two years.

Built to a Flemish-Baronial style, the town house was opened in 1882 by Queen Victoria's second son, Alfred.

The building is owned by the Inverness Common Good Fund and is a working local authority building.

In 2012, councillors scrapped a plan to move all meetings away from the town house.

Meetings of Highland Council's Inverness city committee were to be shifted to the local authority's headquarters in Glenurquhart Road.

But councillors were concerned the move would diminish the role of the town house.

The building hosted the only gathering of Liberal Prime Minister David Lloyd George's UK government cabinet outside London.

He was on holiday in Gairloch, Wester Ross, and brought his ministers together in Inverness in September 1921.

The meeting was called following Ireland's rejection of the King.