Some little Scottish birds are in for a treat this summer as a collection of birdhouses prepare to pop up in back gardens.

In a sort of Grand Designs project for the feathered homeowner, the brightly decorated dwellings were made by keen local residents, NHS staff and 30 Scotland-based artists.

The Pimp your Roost project, led by Lindsay Perth, now has more than 100 individually designed birdhouses to be auctioned off on May 7 to raise money for local charities in Edinburgh.

Birdhouse 'Pimpers' included volunteers from the Pilton Equalities Project, Knit and Natter, Zoo Arts, and local health visitors.

Lindsay, the artist-in-residence at North Edinburgh Arts, says she is delighted at how many people came together to work on them.

"Roost has been so successful, it's started so many conversations about creativity and what is community," she says.

"These birdhouses are a plethora of individuality and creativity, and when they come together it shows us as a collective. We are all the same yet all unique.

"I really look forward to seeing them as birdhouses but also art objects in the gardens and streets of Edinburgh."

Roost is based in Muirhouse, one of the most deprived parts of Edinburgh and associated with antisocial behaviour and major drug use problems.

In recent years major redevelopment of the area has taken place, with many community projects like Lindsay's really making an impact.

The event will take place at Custom Lane in Leith from 12.30pm, with a silent bid followed by a live auction at 2pm. Bidding is set to start at £4.

Funds from the birdhouses will go to North Edinburgh Arts groups, several of which have recently lost funding.

"These groups are vital in supporting the community and drawing people towards place, identity, creativity and a feeling of civic pride," says Lindsay.

The birdhouse design was made with advice from the RSPB so that the size of the entry hole and the walls are in keeping with the guidelines for blue tits in North Edinburgh - the kind of bird that will most likely use the houses after the installation.

A colourful mix of blue, yellow, white and green makes the blue tit one of our most attractive and most recognisable garden visitors.

In winter, family flocks join up with other tits as they search for food. A garden with four or five blue tits at a feeder at any one time may be feeding 20 or more.

Blue tits are easy to recognise, with a blue cap and yellow breast.

In spring and summer, watch out for young blue tits which have yellow instead of white cheeks.

They are found throughout the UK apart from a few Scottish islands.

The team behind the art project are now hopeful that the idea for the stunning decorated birdhouses will take flight across the rest of Scotland also.

Speaking ahead of the auction North Edinburgh Arts director Kate Wimpress said: "We're delighted with how many people have engaged with this project exploring what home and community means to them.

"The birdhouses perfectly capture how people from all ages and backgrounds can unite and still retain their own individual vision and voice."