Scotland has produced some extraordinary architecture since the beginning of the 21st century.
The past 25 years have brought buildings by some of the world’s most celebrated architects, but also smaller projects where Scottish practices have produced work that has attracted international attention.
From a ferry shelter on Tiree to a whisky distillery buried beneath the Speyside landscape, the best buildings are not necessarily the biggest or most expensive.
Here are 12 of the greatest Scottish buildings completed since 2000.
12. OVO Hydro, Glasgow
Designed by Foster + Partners and opened in 2013, the arena was conceived around the form of ancient Greek and Roman amphitheatres, with its distinctive translucent exterior allowing the building to glow after dark.
Its architecture may be less subtle than some of the buildings higher on this list, but its impact is difficult to dispute. Alongside the SEC Armadillo, the Hydro has created one of the most recognisable pieces of Glasgow’s modern skyline and helped reshape the Clydeside around Finnieston.
11. Perth Concert Hall, Perth
Opened in 2005, Perth Concert Hall was the result of an international architectural competition won by BDP.
The 1,200-seat auditorium sits inside a distinctive oval building, with a copper-clad upper section rising above the surrounding city centre. A glazed foyer opens towards the public square outside.
It is a particularly successful example of contemporary architecture being inserted into the centre of one of Scotland’s historic cities without attempting to imitate the buildings around it.
10. Cuddymoss, North Ayrshire
One of the smallest buildings on the list is also one of the most remarkable.
Designed by Ann Nisbet Studio, Cuddymoss is a house created within the remains of a ruined agricultural building in rural North Ayrshire.
The architects retained elements of the old stone structure and placed the new home within it.
Cuddymoss won the 2023 RIAS Andrew Doolan Best Building in Scotland Award, becoming a striking example of how Scotland’s existing rural buildings can be adapted rather than simply replaced.
9. Nucleus, Wick
A national nuclear archive on the outskirts of Wick is the setting for some of Scotland’s finest contemporary architecture.
Designed by Reiach and Hall, the building contains the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority’s national archive alongside the Caithness County Archive.
Its long, sculptural form draws on the distinctive landscape and climate of Caithness, while the building has to accommodate highly technical archive and security requirements.
It won both a RIBA National Award and the 2018 Andrew Doolan Best Building in Scotland Award.
8. Dunfermline Carnegie Library & Galleries
Richard Murphy Architects managed a difficult trick with the new Dunfermline Carnegie Library & Galleries: creating an unapologetically modern building immediately beside some of the city’s most historic architecture.
Completed in 2017, the project expanded the existing Carnegie Library to create new museum, gallery and exhibition spaces.
Stone, oak and weathering steel are used throughout, while windows and internal sightlines deliberately frame historic buildings outside, including Dunfermline Abbey.
The project won the Andrew Doolan Best Building in Scotland Award in 2017.
7. City of Glasgow College, City Campus
Designed by Reiach and Hall and Michael Laird Architects, City Campus brought a series of different departments together inside a huge city-centre building filled with internal streets, open spaces and natural light.
The scale of the project makes the quality of its architecture particularly impressive.
It received a RIBA National Award and was one of six buildings shortlisted for the 2017 Stirling Prize, the UK’s most prestigious architectural award.
6. Riverside Museum, Glasgow
Zaha Hadid’s Riverside Museum is one of the most immediately recognisable buildings built in Scotland this century.
Opened in 2011 at the meeting point of the rivers Clyde and Kelvin, the home of Glasgow’s transport collection is dominated by its extraordinary folded roof.
The building effectively forms a twisting tunnel between the city and the river, with huge glazed elevations at either end.
Its uncompromising design divided opinion when it opened, and the enormous internal space is not without problems as a museum. Yet as a piece of architecture it has given Glasgow one of its defining modern buildings.
The museum subsequently won European Museum of the Year in 2013.
5. Sir Duncan Rice Library, Aberdeen
One of Scotland’s most distinctive modern buildings rises unexpectedly above the historic campus of the University of Aberdeen.
Designed by Danish architects Schmidt Hammer Lassen and completed in 2011, the Sir Duncan Rice Library appears from the outside as a sharply defined glass cube, its facade broken up by an irregular pattern of white vertical lines.
At the heart of the building is a vast atrium that twists upwards through the floors, creating a series of sweeping openings in deliberate contrast with the rigid geometry of the exterior.
The building was designed to create a new focal point for the university’s King’s College campus while providing a modern home for collections accumulated over hundreds of years.
It won an RIAS Award and a RIBA National Award in 2013 and was given a special mention by the judges of the Andrew Doolan Best Building in Scotland Award.
4. An Turas, Tiree
Created by Sutherland Hussey Architects with artists Jake Harvey, Glen Onwin, Donald Urquhart and Sandra Kennedy, the structure beside Tiree’s ferry terminal is part shelter, part viewing platform and part artwork.
Visitors move through three spaces: high white walls open to the sky, a timber-covered bridge and finally a glass box looking across Gott Bay.
The entire project distils elements of Tiree - its skies, white beaches, black houses and horizontal landscape - into one simple structure.
It won Scotland’s best building award in 2003 and was shortlisted for both the RIBA Stirling Prize and the Mies van der Rohe Award.
3. V&A Dundee
There had been nothing quite like the V&A in Scotland before it appeared on Dundee’s waterfront.
Designed by Japanese architect Kengo Kuma, the museum opened in September 2018 as the centrepiece of the city’s long-term waterfront regeneration.
Kuma’s design was inspired partly by Scotland’s coastal cliffs. Thousands of precast stone panels project from its curving walls, creating a constantly changing pattern of light and shadow, while part of the museum extends into the River Tay.
The architecture succeeded in giving Dundee an internationally recognised building that changed perceptions of the city’s cultural scene.
2. The Macallan Distillery, Speyside
The Macallan commissioned one of the most ambitious pieces of industrial architecture ever constructed in Scotland.
Designed by Rogers Stirk Harbour + Partners and completed in 2018, the distillery is pushed into the contours of the Macallan estate beneath an undulating timber roof covered with grass and wildflowers.
Beneath it sits a highly sophisticated production facility, with the whisky-making process deliberately exposed to visitors.
The result manages to be monumental and surprisingly restrained at the same time.
The Macallan won the 2019 Andrew Doolan Best Building in Scotland Award and was shortlisted for the RIBA Stirling Prize.
1. Scottish Parliament, Edinburgh
The argument surrounding the construction of the Scottish Parliament, involving protracted delays and escalating costs, dominated its early years. Two decades later, it is possible to judge the architecture on its own merits and its transformational effect.
Designed by Enric Miralles and Benedetta Tagliabue’s EMBT with RMJM, the Holyrood complex opened in 2004.
Miralles produced a collection of interconnected buildings, courtyards and landscaped spaces intended to grow out of the ground beneath Arthur’s Seat.
Inside are some of Scotland’s most memorable modern interiors, including the timber-lined debating chamber, Garden Lobby and committee rooms.
Its eccentric windows, upturned boat forms, exposed concrete, stone, timber and extraordinary detailing still make it unlike almost any other government building in the world.
The building won the RIBA Stirling Prize in 2005, with the judges praising the way it makes an organic transition between Edinburgh and the surrounding Scottish landscape.
It remains an ambitious, complex and unmistakably Scottish piece of architecture.