NE Scotland & Northern Isles Integrated Mortuary

The Northeast Scotland and the Northern Isles Integrated Mortuary has been designed to operate as a single integrated multi-partner, multi-purpose, mortuary serving NHS Grampian, Aberdeen City Council, Aberdeenshire Council, Moray Council, Orkney and Shetland Island Councils, the University of Aberdeen, Crown Office Procurator Fiscal Service and Police Scotland.

Mortuary design requires a thoughtful approach, combining operational efficiency with sensitivity to its unique role in society. At its core, it is a building where death is examined but its purpose extends beyond a purely clinical function. The building itself requires functional demands beyond a medical facility and a key aim of the project was to ensure respectful treatment for those who have passed and to provide a relaxed and welcoming environment for bereaved families and staff.

Extensive stakeholder engagement with staff and the multiple agencies who deliver these services, along with representatives of bereaved families ensured the design aligned with the core principles of the client brief. This included privacy and dignity in the bereavement suites, and functional segregation between bereaved families, and staff and students.

Clad in buff facing brick with a pitched standing seam roof, the building has been designed to stand out from the more typical healthcare architecture in the hospital campus, and to reflect a domestic scaled environment. A brick colonnade connects the public entrance and visiting area with a private garden and the adjacent greenspace, providing quiet respite for bereaved families.

The ground floor is divided into three distinct zones of accommodation. To the front, the main public entrance connects to the bereavement suite, where private viewing rooms and internal courtyards provide tranquillity and privacy in a welcoming and non-clinical environment. The central zone contains the post-mortem and observation rooms, staff changing, and body storage areas along with a CT Scanner suite, and to the rear a large garage area allows vehicles to arrive and depart discreetly.

On the upper floor, private offices and meeting rooms for staff, along with multi-use rooms for teaching and learning ensure separation from families and visitors and address the functional segregation requirements of the brief.

The mortuary was designed to meet NHS Scotland’s energy and carbon targets and Aberdeen City Council’s Building Performance Policy including net-zero greenhouse emissions and an EPC rating of A. It is powered by electric boilers and incorporates over 600m2 of roof-mounted solar PV panels. U-values that are almost half those required by building regulations and an air permeability rating of 3m3/h/m2 have combined to create a resilient, high-performance building that is one of Scotland’s first Net Zero operational energy healthcare buildings.

Keppie Design fulfilled the role of design team lead on behalf of Kier Construction. The project began during the Coronavirus pandemic, which required the team to adopt a new remote working model, yet despite these challenges, the concept design remained clear and robust, and the new mortuary is now regarded as an exemplar for future mortuary projects across the UK.