BLOCK Architecture Festival - The HG submission

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BLOCK Architecture Festival - The HG submission

Postby Sharon » Thu Aug 12, 2004 10:51 am

Ok, well we are decided on doing something for the festival based upon buldings that no longer exist either physically or perhaps only not as they were originally intended.

The title is "Look. There it isn't"

What we are now looking for is lots of suggestions for buildings / sites / events / incidents that could fall under this loose heading within the city centre. And ideally when suggesting something (although not essential at this stage) check and see if you an locate a photograph.

So suggestions please. Make your suggestions by listing the building or site location as it is now and detail what it was previously.

If you try and make your suggestions before Monday. We are on a very tight schedule !!!

Oh, the final "product" will be a leaflet / pamphlet with a map, photos information and perhaps a routed walk... this has still to be formalised but there will be a product!
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Postby DMcNay » Thu Aug 12, 2004 2:06 pm

Was: British Linen Bank, Queen Street (There's a picture in the City That Disappeared" book

IS: Bank of Scotland. Horrendous concretey-marble looking THING. It's atrocious.

Must stop. Thinking about this one makes me angry.
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Postby AMcD » Thu Aug 12, 2004 2:32 pm

Here's a rather nice photo of it from the mitchell Doc...

http://www.mitchelllibrary.org/vm/images/g268/g026879x.jpg
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Postby DMcNay » Thu Aug 12, 2004 2:34 pm

Lovely. :D

Bet they wish they'd kept it....
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Postby DickyHart » Thu Aug 12, 2004 3:40 pm

what about this.

http://www.scotcities.com/townhead.htm

I sugget townhead library, i always had a soft spot for it, it was beautiful inside and out, the info stuff is at the bottom of the page.

cheers

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Postby Fossil » Thu Aug 12, 2004 4:40 pm

Bum tit tit bum tit tit play yer hairy banjo
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Postby nodrog » Thu Aug 12, 2004 6:45 pm

OK, here's my first submission. I'm working on the photos side of things; and have entirely guestimated the length and tone to take with the writing. Comments welcome but be gentle!

Gordon

From the still there but drastically changed category...

Savoy Centre
140 Sauchiehall Street
Since the mid-1970s, the Savoy Centre has been a fixture on Glasgow's shopping landscape. Yet this is a building that dates back to the late 1890s and has had several different incarnations over the years. It was built in 1891 as a warehouse for the furnishings company Cumming & Smith - Sauchiehall street had several large warehouses on it at that time - and this was designed to be one of the grandest. Later, in 1913, the warehouse was demolished apart from its facade, and the Picture House Cinema (later the Gaumont) constructed behind it. Walk through the entrance that now leads to a collection of small shops, and try to imagine coming out into a large open foyer, with palm trees, a fountain and cages of singing birds, before continuing to an opulent auditorium with a huge golden roman chariot moulded above the proscenium. The cinema closed and was eventually demolished - again apart from the facade! - in 1972.
On the same city block - and demolished at the same time - was the New Savoy cinema - from which today's Savoy Centre took its name.
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Postby nodrog » Thu Aug 12, 2004 7:04 pm

Building Two - one thats completely gone, although its purpose continues on the same site:


Green's Playhouse / UGC Cinema
The very site where the UGC - the world's tallest cinema, and now the UK's busiest - now stands has for generations been a destination for locals seeking entertainment. Showman George Green - who started out showing films in his showground in the Gallowgate at the dawn of the cinema age - gradually built up his own circuit of cinemas in the 1920s. The Glasgow Green's Playhouse was to be his flagship and crowning achievement, and a unique combination of entertainment venues. Opening in 1927 behind a rather plain facade reused from an earlier warehouse on the site, the complex featured tea rooms, offices, an enormous ballroom, and a putting green! These were all in addition to the enormous 6000 seat cinema, the largest in Europe. This eventually closed in 1973 as cinema audiences dwindled, only to reopen as the famous live music venue the Apollo. In this guise it lived on until 1986, and the entire building was on the verge of being heritage listed when one of Glasgow's surprisingly common 'mysterious fires' rendered the building unsafe, and complete demolition quickly followed.
[Why not take the escalators to the top floor of the UGC, and enjoy dramatic views across the city?]
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Postby nodrog » Thu Aug 12, 2004 7:23 pm

Right, this is the last one for this evening.

Someone elses turn now - otherwise the entire leaflet will be made up of cinemas and theatres - and while I'd find that fascinating, I think a wider mix of buildings would be better!

Gordon


Sauchiehall St - West Nile Street to Renfield Street stretch
This section of Sauchiehall Street was comprehensively redeveloped in the 1960s. Until that point, it was quite a hive of theatrical activity. On the north side, where Burger King stands now, was the Royalty Theatre of 1880, designed in the French Renaissance style with an interior by Frank Matcham. The building also incorporated a hotel, and when the entire block was purchased by the YMCA, this was converted into a hostel. The theatre was later renamed the Lyric, and used for amateur productions and occasional film shows, until the block was demolished in the 1960s.
The block directly across from this on the south side of the street was the site of the infamous Glasgow Empire. This opened in 1897 as the Empire Palace, on the site of an earlier theatre, the Gaiety. The interior was also designed by Matcham - whose opulent interior design style can still be seen today in the Kings Theatre - and the music hall venue was so popular that the auditorium was enlarged in the 1930s to increase the capacity. Many comedians and other variety acts still speak in hushed tones of having to survive an unappreciative audience at the Glasgow Empire....
It finally closed in 1963 and was demolished, to be replaced by the concrete office block and shops named Empire House that are visible today.
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Postby Gazzathecoigne » Fri Aug 13, 2004 1:35 am

St. Enoch hotel also.
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Postby Sharon » Sun Aug 15, 2004 3:34 pm

C'mon, more suggestions please people ... pretty please :wink:
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Postby nodrog » Sun Aug 15, 2004 8:35 pm

Yes please people - or I'll be forced to write about more cinemas. And trust me, you don't want that...
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Postby crusty_bint » Sun Aug 15, 2004 9:49 pm

Great stuff Gordon :D

How about:
*Glasgow Central. An exploration of the hidden depths of Central Station. The abondoned low level platforms, the extent of which encompassed the whole area from the front door of the Radisson, to the back door of Westergate. Cafe l'ombrellone, on the corner of Argyll and Hope Sts is where the lift was to access the low level (Im sure i read this was a livestock lift somewhere?). Could also tie this in with Norrie Gilliland. We could even see if the Arches want to give us some money (or free drink) for having thier name on it?

Bridge St station. The pre-cursor to Glasgow Central, this could be the focus of an exploration of Bridge St itself. Nice little ecclectic enclave of buildings to have survived the demolitions of "re-development".

Glasgow Royal Infirmary (the Adam one)
This is probably covered in the standard guide but could tie in with the Necropolis, the Molendinar and our elusive PO tunnel as well as the tunnels under the present Royal Infirmary.

Starks Lunatic Asylum. Parliamentary Rd. This one will be tricky because the street isnt even there any more, could tie in with the not-so-hidden horror of the post war redevelopment of Glasgow.

PO Tunnel. The north Hanover St lift shaft and Lucy boxes. We know it exists but what is its true extent?

Glasgow Cross Station. A look at how the ancient Cross has changed, defunct rail systems, gap sites, where the station stood, what happened to it(St Vincent St toilets)?

Warehouses. A look at the facades of these great warehouses, what they were used for, whats happening to them etc etc

(Im tiring now)

Duke St Prison.

St Enoch Hotel, Station and rail network.
Old stations, the arches in King St etc

Virginia Galleries

Royal Maternity Hospital (Rottenrow)

Grand Hotel. Charing cross


Any more suggestions folks? Any comments on what you think we should write for any of these places, or any of your own for that matter?

Anyone?

Crusty :D
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Postby Gazzathecoigne » Mon Aug 16, 2004 1:01 am

Just back from the pub tonight. Winning question was, Juke St. Jail"! Consider this for the thread's answer????
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Postby gap74 » Mon Aug 16, 2004 7:57 am

I think highlighting some of the recent losses through neglect would be good, although it may end up sounding like an anti-council rant if we expressed exactly how we felt about it!

So Virginia Galleries, Greek Thomson's offices in West Regent Street and his warehouses near Glasgow Cross, all currently ugly gap sites which help accentuate the sense of loss.

Could also suggest Glasgow Green Station, since there's still something of the street level building there to hint it what it once was.

Not quite cinemas, but there are plenty of theatres that I could waffle about for a paragraph or two - the legendary Empire (now a hideously small low rise concrete block, whose only saving grace is an Ann Summers shop!) , the gargantuan Alhambra (now anonymous offices) and the two Theatre Royals other than the one I'm sitting in just now - the Dunlop Street one being replaced by a railway station followed by the St Enoch Centre, and the Queen St one, near what is now GoMA.

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