Project Update October 2026
The new Liberton Community Campus opened for pupils on Thursday 13th August 2026. Information on when other community facilities within the building will be ready for use will be published soon.
Balfour Beatty was appointed by the Council to deliver the new building, which has been designed by jmarchitects. The new campus has been formed with the needs of learners in mind. To encourage collaborative learning, the school building features breakout and retreat spaces to offer pupils choice on where they want to work, socialise or take time out.
Large windows fill the building with natural light, while helping to connect departments and classrooms with outdoor spaces. Internal spaces have been decorated with warm colours and light woods to create comfortable spaces for learning and coming together.
Outdoor sports facilities include a new 3G synthetic rugby and football pitch and a multi-use games area. A new grass recreation area that can be lined for football or other sports activities will be added following the demolition of the former Liberton High School building.
The 1,200-space school forms the centrepiece of the new Liberton Community Campus, a multi-purpose facility to help meet the needs of young people, their families and the wider community.
Its spaces have been designed to allow all generations to come together in a number of ways, including a community café, library, GP surgery and workspaces for Council partners. New sports facilities operated by Edinburgh Leisure will feature bookable amenities for the whole community, including a fitness suite and dance studio.
Information on when the other community facilities within the building will be ready for use will be published soon.
The new Community Campus has been built to Passivhaus standard, minimising energy consumption and reducing the reliance on active heating or cooling systems, ensuring sustainable and eco-friendly construction.
In addition to the Passivhaus design, the new school contains other sustainable features supporting the Council to meet its sustainability commitments. This includes measures to improve the air quality and thermal performance of the building which are vital to achieving Passivhaus certification.
The new school building has been designed in line with the guiding principles of the Scottish Government’s Learning Estate Strategy and is one of the projects in the second phase of the Scottish Government’s Learning Estate Investment Programme, alongside the project to redevelop Wester Hailes High School.
Project Archive
The Vision
This exciting project provides an amazing opportunity to create, as part of an inclusive net zero-carbon city, a community lifelong learning and sports hub to replace the existing Liberton High School. The brief for the project is to create a vibrant and thriving learning environment for 1200 students, where public services, including a Community Library and NHS GP Surgery, can be co-located with links to active travel networks, green infrastructure and public transport networks. This Community Hub vision for the building to be ‘more than a school’ aligns with the City of Edinburgh Council’s ‘Living Well Locally’ Strategy – to localise and co-locate services, making them more accessible for communities and to improve the experiences and outcomes for their citizens.
Construction Photos below are from March 2026
A view from the second floor looking towards the front of the building and down into the school dining area 
A view from the school library on the first floor, looking down into the school dining area 
A view from the school library on the first floor, looking down into the school dining area 
The Science Super Lab 
The Social stair leading from the rear school dining area to Expressive Arts
Construction Photos below are from July 2025
External view of main entrance 
External rear entrance view 
External rear elevation view 
External side elevation view 
Ground Floor Interior from Dining area towards main entrance 
Ground Floor Interior main foyer entrance 
View from first floor Interior into main foyer entrance area 
First floor view from Art into CDT area 
Second floor view down onto first floor Library
The project will develop excellent facilities that meet all the aspirations of the Scottish Government Learning Estate Investment Strategy to connect people, places and learning, to improve outcomes for all and to promote sustainable and inclusive economic growth.
The City of Edinburgh Council is committed to all learning estate building investment being constructed to Passivhaus standards, designed to meet the city-wide aspirations for our schools to be as energy efficient as possible in response to the Climate Emergency and Edinburgh’s 2030 Net Zero target.
What’s Happened So Far?
Through the Arcadis Project Management Team, early engagement and consultation with stakeholders started in January 2021 and continued until June. This process involved interviews, workshops and presentations to form a Strategic Brief that captured the aspirations of the local community, as well as incorporating the wider Council objectives for the building to become a Community Hub. The completed Strategic Brief was then handed to the Architects in the Design Team (JM Architects) who started to design the building and plan for the accommodation and spaces required. In the meantime, an assessment of the existing site and how the new building would work within it was carried out, with discussions on how best to arrange the entire site to minimise disruption to the existing school and local community during the construction phase.
Parent Council Presentation – August 2022
Initial discussions on how learning spaces across the school could be arranged took place with Liberton staff and this produced the first draft floor plans, ready to take forward into the next stages of detailed design, engagement and consultation with all stakeholders.
With the Planning Application approved and with Balfour Beatty assigned as the main Contractor, a final plan for delivery was agreed and enabling works began on Monday 30th October 2023, progressing towards an opening date for 2026. The subsequent demolition of the old building and construction of new outdoor sports facilities is planned to complete in 2027.
