scotland’s first ‘living building’ will feature a lightweight geodesic dome
plans underway for Grimshaw’s Futures Institute
Grimshaw has revealed designs for the Futures Institute at Dollar Academy (FIDA) in central Scotland, a domed educational center that’s set to achieve the country’s first Living Building certification. The scheme seeks to minimize embodied carbon with minimal use of concrete in favor of glue-laminated timber. The building will be topped with a lightweight, glulam geodesic dome clad with insulated ETFE pillows and solid insulated panes with photovoltaic panels.
images courtesy of Grimshaw
architecture to inspire the next generation
Situated at the southern end of the existing private school campus, FIDA is accessed by a network of pathways and botanical gardens reinstated from a previous 19th-century plan. Heavily planted terraces, berms ponds and swales support the building’s water and waste needs, providing an invaluable educational resource and an inspirational recreational environment.
Flooded with natural light, the interior is meant to capture the sense of being in a highly tempered outdoor space. The first floor is centered around a large open space for projects and performances and is linked to the second floor by stepped auditorium seating constructed from timber. Workshops and laboratories line the perimeter with glazing providing transparency and openness. The second floor is constructed from cross-laminated timber with space for traditional and experimental gardens. A flexible, partitioned classroom structure spans the open void offering a multi-use landscaped roof terrace.
the interior is designed to make students feel like they’re outside
Launched in May 2021, FIDA is an initiative that aims to tackle challenges in education such as sustainability, closing the poverty-related attainment gap, and finding compelling alternatives to traditional teaching and exam systems. The project offers young people across Scotland opportunities to undertake real-world challenges founded on the 17 UN Sustainable Development Goals. These take the form of workshops, skills-based courses, design challenges and competitions, both online and in-person.
Grimshaw Chairman and Dollar Academy alum Andrew Whalley comments, ‘Dollar Academy has a long history of encouraging students to explore the arts which of course fuels the imagination and creative problem solving. It’s now leading the way with a paradigm shift in learning, to be shared as an open platform resource.’
He adds, ‘Such an initiative requires an equally fresh approach to its future center, with an architecture that will support team working, collaboration and exploring new creative sustainable solutions that will empower and inspire the next generation to tackle the planetary problems we now all face.’
the building will be topped with a lightweight, glulam geodesic dome
the new educational center will be constructed at the southern end of the existing private school campus
project info:
name: Futures Institute at Dollar Academy (FIDA)
location: Dollar, Scotland, the UK
lead architect: Grimshaw
engineering: Buro Happold
