• Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer
  • Home
  • Articles
  • Blog
  • About
  • Contribute
  • Contact

Sceptical Scot

Asking Questions. Seeking Answers.

You are here: Home / Articles / Not just a pretty facade: Glasgow heritage has a beating heart

Not just a pretty facade: Glasgow heritage has a beating heart

March 8, 2019 by Fay Young Leave a Comment

Up or down? What does the future hold for Glasgow’s Sauchiehall Street? Could this fire-haunted place become the centre of Glasgow City of Music?  

The question comes with just a hint of provocation from Glasgow School of Art’s Professor Johnny Rodger as he sits in a bar with DJ Jim Gellatly.

They are discussing music, architecture, urban planning and other sometimes conflicting facts of city life for the latest Talking Feet podcast.

Sitting outside the Saramago Bar (yes, outside in Glasgow, and before the heatwave too!), our two commentators are roughly half way up – or down – the commercial part of Sauchiehall Street.

Professor Johnny Rodger, in a clip from his GSA lecture
 GSA’s Professor Johnny Rodger also guides A Brisk Walking of buildings at risk in Glasgow

Well-placed, then, to contemplate the fate of two landmarks devastated by the blazing fires of 2018, as well as the tree planting which lends a softer, more optimistic view of the future.

Demolish O2ABC?

Up or down? The answer is up for grabs. The owners of the O2ABC, Academy Music Group, have applied for permission to demolish the wonderful old Art Deco cinema – just a few steps from where Jim and Johnny had been sitting.

The music venue has been closed since the 2018 fire which all but demolished the Mackintosh building a little further up the hill. On the night of 15 June that fire also ripped through the roof of the ABC.

What happens next? While a petition opposing the demolition quickly gained support, Glasgow City Council was equally quick to stress that no decision has been taken. The owners are building their case with evidence from construction experts. But there’s a long bureaucratic process to go through yet.

Cllr Susan Aitken's tweeted advice on how to object to O2ABC demolition

Council leader Susan Aitken tweeted advice on how to make an effective planning objection. Glasgow Live followed up with further guidance on how and where to write to reject (or approve) the plans. Glasgow SNP MSPs Alison Thewliss and Sandra White have written their objection letters, along with Paul Sweeney, Labour MP for Glasgow North East, who describes the proposed demolition as ‘architectural vandalism’ arguing for ‘facade retention’ of the listed building.

Think Glasgow city plan. Talk Glasgow’s historic environment.

What is historic environment?

That requires skilful wording and careful study of the city plan. And what is Glasgow’s historic environment? In many ways that’s what is at the heart of the conversation between these two ‘Talking Feet’. Not the historic heritage of grand architecture, but the living, singing, often nostalgic, heritage of what places mean to people; the buildings that stay in hearts and minds – long after they have been reduced to rubble.

The human heritage of a building is not just the architecture but what happens inside. It’s what helps to create a sense of belonging. As so often in Glasgow there’s a vital, even visceral, link between the place, the people and the music they make together. Places like the ABC and the Mac have obvious aesthetic and architectural significance but emotional value has little to do with the façade in places like Nice N Sleazy, which provide the essential foundation of Glasgow’s grassroots.

And the threats are often more subtle than the demolition squad. So Johnny and Jim celebrate the continuing success of venues like Sleazy’s as they linger over what used to be the ‘scuzzier’ end of Sauchiehall Street.

Nostalgia is a sticky substance

This part of Glasgow has seen its share of ups and downs in the last hundred years. Are musicians the vanguard of gentrification, wonders Johnny, is music part of the remaking of a place? ‘Hmm, says Jim, ‘As long as you don’t get rid of the sticky carpets.’ More seriously, he imagines the immediate outcry if Nice N Sleazy’s existence were ever threatened.

Nostalgia is a stubbornly sticky substance. But this conversation mixes affection for the past (the long-gone Apollo) with welcome for newcomers and the buzzing ecosystem of the street

So many fantastic basement bars in Sauchiehall Street. And opposite the CCA a new venue called Blue Arrow, a jazz bar, how cool is that?’: Jim Gellatly

And the £7.5 million Sauchiehall Street face-lift: what’s not to like in tree-lined streets and pavement cafes (if Copenhagen can do it so can Glasgow)? But they have a challenge for city planners. Those derelict buildings? Those fire-razed sites? What’s the city plan?

While Jim makes a heartfelt case for the cultural value of the ABC, Johnny adds another provocatively good idea for that empty space once occupied by the Victoria nightclub. Gutted by fire in March 2018. it was demolished three months later. Now? Instead of just more shops, says Johnny, how about a new music centre.   Glasgow is a world music city isn’t it? Why don’t we have a centre for that in Sauchiehall Street?

Johnny Rodger: Glasgow is a world music city isn’t it? Why don’t we have a centre for that in Sauchiehall Street?

Jim Gellatly: Isn’t that prime real estate?

So…

Up or down?

That’s up to the way we tell the story perhaps. There’s a great store of knowledge in this podcast – and one real cracker for a pub quiz which takes listeners far beyond the architectural appearance of the building. Which famous US President made his first public speech in Sauchiehall Street? And where?

Ok, we’ll tell you. The story begins with Jim and Johnny mulling over the different lives of another beautiful Art Deco building, The Beresford: former hotel, one time music venue, now converted to flats.

Jim Gellatly looking interested but just a tad quizzical
‘No way, I’m going to have to Google that’. Jim Gellatly, voice of Glasgow Music Tour.

Johnny: The amazing thing about the Beresford is that is the first place that John F Kennedy gave his first public speech …

Jim: What, his first public speech in Britain?

Johnny: No! In the world. EVER. In his life.

Jim: IN HIS LIFE?

Johnny: He was a young man, he was in his early 20s…his father was the American ambassador in London…

Jim: No Way, I’m going to have to Google that later…that’s amazing.

Johnny: Isn’t it great…

And it’s true. Check for yourselves. But be sure to listen to the rest of this conversation. Heritage. History. A city plan – it always needs a heart.


Talking Feet Episode 10 with Johnny Rodger and Jim Gellatly. 

Featured image is Glasgow fire: smoke on Sauchiehall Street. Alasdair Clark CC By-SA-2.0

This is a slightly edited version of the article published on Walking Heads blog.

Filed Under: Articles, Culture Tagged With: architecture, Glasgow, heritage, historic environment

About Fay Young

Fay Young is co-editor of Sceptical Scot, a writer and editor with special interest in arts and the environment, both natural and manmade. She is research and development director of Walking Heads, board member of ACTive Inquiry forum theatre, and founder-organiser of multicultural open space community group, Leith Open Space,

Reader Interactions

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Primary Sidebar

About Sceptical Scot

Welcome to Sceptical Scot, Scotland’s premier non-tribal forum for passionate, informed debate. Sceptical Scot is for all who care about Scotland’s future, regardless of how they vote: for party, independence or union, EU or Brexit. We aim to provide an arena that is both broader and deeper than current online/print offers with a rich diet of well-researched, polemical, thought-provoking writing. Read more » about About Sceptical Scot

What’s new on Sceptical Scot

  • Can Scotland enjoy a ‘velvet divorce’ from UK? January 11, 2023
  • Should Wales leave the UK? December 16, 2022
  • Swinney should use his fiscal powers to the full: Update December 12, 2022
  • The SNP’s new fundamentalism December 6, 2022
  • A voluntary union with no exit? November 25, 2022
  • Unhelpful clarifications on #indyref2 November 24, 2022
  • It’s time to talk to the neighbours November 21, 2022
  • A monetary straitjacket: Scottish Government economic plan for independence November 3, 2022
  • Can muscular unionism save the Union? November 3, 2022
  • The left must abandon high tax policies October 25, 2022

The Sceptical Newsletter

The Sceptical Scot cartoon

A small ship, hopelessly at sea

Categories

  • Articles (656)
  • Blog (534)
  • Books & Poetry (26)
  • Brexit (204)
  • climate crisis (27)
  • climate crisis (5)
  • Covid19 (65)
  • Criminal justice (17)
  • Culture (303)
  • Devo20 (1)
  • Economics (189)
  • Economy (104)
  • Education (75)
  • Elections (187)
  • Environment (65)
  • European Union (256)
  • Featured (41)
  • Federalism (17)
  • federalism (13)
  • Health (63)
  • History (68)
  • Housing (23)
  • Humour (10)
  • identity (13)
  • Independence (272)
  • Inequality (76)
  • International (34)
  • Ireland (7)
  • Ireland (6)
  • Local government (81)
  • Longer reads (71)
  • Media (9)
  • Podcast (3)
  • Poetry (72)
  • Policy (211)
  • Politics (332)
  • Polls and quizzes (1)
  • Reviews (24)
  • Social democracy (84)
  • Trump (10)
  • UK (338)
  • Uncategorized (6)

Sceptical Scot elsewhere

Facebook
Twitter

Footer

About Sceptical Scot

Since 2014 Sceptical Scot has offered a non-tribal forum for passionate, informed debate for all who care about Scotland’s future

Recommended

  • Bella Caledonia
  • Centre on Constitutional Change
  • The UK in a Changing Europe
  • Common Space
  • Gerry Hassan
  • Scottish Review
  • Social Europe
  • Think Scotland

Archives

Copyright © 2023 · Magazine Pro on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in

 

Loading Comments...