Robert Burns Birthplace Museum: An International Museum
A major new Burns Museum has been given a stage one pass by the Heritage Lottery Fund. The museum will form one of the highlights of the Scottish Executive’s ‘Year of Homecoming’ celebrations and will allow people of all interests and backgrounds to study and enjoy the bard's poetry, his songs and his life.
Morham & Brotchie are delighted to have been appointed by The National Trust for Scotland to provide quantity surveying services for this exciting multi-million pound project. The scheme comprises the creation of a new museum to house the extensive Burn's Collection (a fraction of which can only be displayed in the present premises) in an all purpose-built controlled environment; the revamping of the existing museum next to the cottage as an education centre, and the linking of the cottage and museum sites by sensitively landscaped areas and walks such that at the cottage visitors get a feel for the landscape that might have existed during Burn's time whilst at the Museum external performance areas and playgrounds and landscaped garden walks enhance the learning experience. Brief includes requirement to ensure minimum loss of business to the existing Tam ‘o Shanter Experience cafè as it moves over to the new museum site.
The brief for the project incorporates many sustainable and interesting technical solutions such as labyrinth underfloor ventilation, grey-water reclamation and green roofs.
Tenders were received in July 2008 and work is anticipated to commence on site by the end of 2008, with a 24 month contract period.
Project Details
- Client: The National Trust for Scotland
- Museum Designers: Continuum
- Architect: Simpson & Brown
- Structural & Services Engineers: Buro Happold
- Landscape Architect: Peter McGowan Associates
- Value: £13m
- On Site: 2008