West Princes Street

[Vinny the Mackem]

Anyone got any idea what this building on West Princes Street used to be? It's on the south side of the street. There appears to be a "horse" entrance to the right of the building (I couldn't get it all, the sun was over the building!) The stables (if that's what it was) has the street number 267 on it.



Oh, and yes, I have searched!

[The Egg Man]

Is that the former Scottish Ballet building - originally built as a TA drill hall?

[Dexter St. Clair]

"5th Battalion of the Cameronians (Scottish Rifles), based at West Princes Street Drill hall in the Woodlands area of Glasgow."

[avitacum]

While I couldn't initially find any published record of it myself, I do vaguely remember being told in the late seventies or very early eighties that this building was the home of the Scottish Royal Ballet.

After a search around, I found a web page http://www.scottishballet.co.uk/the-company/hq.htm that mentions it as previously being a former army drill hall.

The Glasgow volume of 'Buildings of Scotland' refers to a drill hall at #26 W. Princes Street (definitely a misprint in this book). It is described as

On the s. side at No.26 a crude former DRILL HALL AND OFFICES by George Bell of Clarke & Bell, 1895-7. The overbearing red Ballochmyle sandstone frontage makes the only break in the ranks of middle-class tenements.

What a put-down!

The reason I asked about it at the time was that it was the only clean building in the whole of a very dirty black West Princes Street. It was explained to me that it was thus because the Queen Mum (gawd bless 'er) had just visited. Shades of the tale of Royal family and the smell of fresh paint.

[Bridie]

Whats the entrance like inside going up to the flats?

[DickyHart]

I could be wrong, but was this building not used as a childrens home for a while?

[fourbytwo]

I remember this building as the Glasgow HQ for the 207th Royal Artillery (TAVR), when it was taken over in the late 70's, I would have been amazed to have seen the plans as your photo only contains half the picture....
Just to the right of your photo was the vehicle entrance which led you through to a massive internal area where mobile guns (anti-aircraft) and their wagons 12 wheel monsters (as big as a double-decker bus), at least a dozen landrovers and trailers, several large generators, (2 of which could be linked to run a hospital) were garaged.
So, in essence the building is misleading as the areas contained beyond the frontage were massive and you could easily put over 1000 people into those areas, and not know they were there.
I ran the Social Club on a Sunday night, which was well attended, and there was a Sargeant's Mess on the first floor which was also crowded each weekend.
The entire TAVR unit moved, lock stock and barrel to a new custom-built building and workshop areas in Crow Road, where it is now located.
What the building was when it was first built......I really don't know but it was a SUBSTANTIAL building in its day....

[The Egg Man]

"5th Battalion of the Cameronians (Scottish Rifles), based at West Princes Street Drill hall in the Woodlands area of Glasgow."

This is dated in http://www.1914-1918.net/scotrif.htm as

"1/5th Battalion
August 1914 : at 261 West Princes Street in Glasgow. Part of Scottish Rifle Brigade, Lowland Division."

but the building looks older than that.

[Vinny the Mackem]

Cheers for the info folks!

[fourbytwo]

Spending some time browsing over that building and the 'nooks and crannies' that made it such a strange building, I wonder if it wasn't a private school or some form of asylum when it was first built...
Must be about 1850's in style so there is likely to be a very interesting history to it, remembering the rear of the building when doing some cleaning etc, there were significant additions to the rear and houses at the rear, again making it a good project for research......

[Grahame]

Worked for many years at old '261' when it was Scottish Ballet, and remember the old drill hall at the back before it was renovated into the scenery store. It has massive cast-iron arches supporting the roof, a shallow balcony most of the way round, and the vast open area in the middle was once covered in parquet blocks.
That space takes up most of the area of the block, and there was a smaller gymnasium-sized hall, also with parquet floor, that was the drill hall per se before it was converted into a studio theatre for the Ballet.
The main building had 3 dance studios and a smaller practice room on the first and second floors, with offices and a small caretaker's flat on the top floor; although that was converted into offices as well as pressure grew for the ever-increasing amount of administration staff that you seem to require in the Arts these days.

There was talk of a property developer buying it up and demolishing the back buildings, replacing them with 5 mews cottages and converting the main building into 15 flats, but that was before the recession.

[Bridie]

Worked for many years at old '261' when it was Scottish Ballet, and remember the old drill hall at the back before it was renovated into the scenery store. It has massive cast-iron arches supporting the roof, a shallow balcony most of the way round, and the vast open area in the middle was once covered in parquet blocks.
That space takes up most of the area of the block, and there was a smaller gymnasium-sized hall, also with parquet floor, that was the drill hall per se before it was converted into a studio theatre for the Ballet.
The main building had 3 dance studios and a smaller practice room on the first and second floors, with offices and a small caretaker's flat on the top floor; although that was converted into offices as well as pressure grew for the ever-increasing amount of administration staff that you seem to require in the Arts these days.

There was talk of a property developer buying it up and demolishing the back buildings, replacing them with 5 mews cottages and converting the main building into 15 flats, but that was before the recession.

side stepping the thread a wee bit - was that the part of Scottish Ballet which came under the umbrella of Robin Anderson, brother of Ian Anderson of Jethro Tull and is he still there?

[Dexter St. Clair]

Just to the right of your photo was the vehicle entrance which led you through to a massive internal area where mobile guns (anti-aircraft) and their wagons 12 wheel monsters (as big as a double-decker bus), at least a dozen landrovers and trailers, several large generators, (2 of which could be linked to run a hospital) were garaged.

"Spending some time browsing over that building and the 'nooks and crannies' that made it such a strange building, I wonder if it wasn't a private school or some form of asylum when it was first built..."

You're getting mixed up with the plot of "If".

[Grahame]

side stepping the thread a wee bit - was that the part of Scottish Ballet which came under the umbrella of Robin Anderson, brother of Ian Anderson of Jethro Tull and is he still there?

Aye, Robin Anderson was the General Administrator back in Peter Darrell's day - the studio theatre was named after him. He's been retired for several years now, but he still pops up at SB reunion events from time to time (as do the rest of us!).

[fatfreddie]

Up until I was about 5 I lived in West Princes Street and I can vaguely remember going into the 'drill hall' as I called it and looking at all the wonderful strange vehicles they had in there. What particularly sticks in my memory was the fact that everything seemed to be the same shade of dark green that Army vehicles were in those days, and how clean they all were, right down to the huge tyres.