OCA Studio were appointed by the Robert Burns Ellisland Trust to undertake an architectural options appraisal for the conservation and future use of Ellisland Farm in Dumfries and Galloway. The Category A-listed farmstead was built by the Scots poet Robert Burns, and is where he lived, worked, and wrote some of his most famous works, including Tam O'Shanter and Auld Lang Syne. Our feasibility project looks to restore and conserve the existing farm buildings, and create a new visitor centre to interpret Burns' life and work at Ellisland, and display the key items of the Ellisland Farm collection in a secure and environmentally-suitable purpose-built space.

The new visitor centre adds a further courtyard to the existing sequence of sheltered outdoor spaces; farmyard, cattle courtyard, kitchen garden and orchard. The paddock becomes an open space buffer separating the new visitor centre from the farmyard, and allows the appearance of the existing cluster of heritage buildings to be conserved. The new courtyard is a gathering space with a sunny aspect, a terrace with outdoor seating for the new cafe, and a supervised playspace for children, from which the farmyard and its key buildings are all visible.

Mirroring the form of Burns’ original steading, the visitor centre has a ‘U’-shaped plan, with the fully- accessible ground floor predominantly for public use. Large rooflights at the corners of the form indicate the arrangement of gaps between buildings seen throughout Ellisland, and bring natural light into the deeper areas of the floorplan.

Part of the vision for Ellisland is to lead the demonstration of a revived focus on using low embodied energy materials, that are part of a fledgling local circular economy. The visitor centre will eschew generic interior finishes, working instead with the principle of revealing the building’s construction to its interior, providing an enriched tactility as well as enhanced visual and acoustic qualities.

The proposals for the existing steading are based on the principle of ‘conservation through use’; creating necessary and appropriate adaptations to the existing fabric that will allow the buildings to be used for a variety of purposes to support the Trust’s aspiration to deliver high quality cultural, educational, environmental and wellbeing activities, and to allow new audiences to engage with the work and life of Robert Burns.