Glasgow, Scotland

Glasgow is the largest city in Scotland and made its name from the industries on the River Clyde from trans Atlantic trade to shipbuilding and associated engineering.

The two photos from the last post of Newcastle Central Station were taken while I was waiting for the train to Glasgow.  As with a lot of places in the UK, there is a historical rivalry between counties and cities which these days is usually evident between sporting teams such as Yorkshire / Lancashire, Manchester / Liverpool and Newcastle / Sunderland. In Scotland though, I feel that the stakes are a little higher as Edinburgh and Glasgow seem to want to fight for pre-eminence with each resident thinking that their city is best. Most tourists prefer Edinburgh but as my family originally came from Glasgow and my Mother worked here early in her life, I seem to have an affiliation with the place. I usually try to visit the city once during the winter time.

Today (6th November) I had a plan to cover a few sights in the east end but despite a glorious sunny ride up the east coast to Edinburgh, I had to change my plan as the skies grew dark with threatening rain clouds on the outskirts of Glasgow at Motherwell. The schedule for the day was mainly outdoors, so a hurried look through the leaflets I had provided me with some quick alternatives to stay dry.

Charles Rennie Mackintosh was born in 1868 near Glasgow Cathedral and after a good education, rare to this city at the time, decided that he was going to become an architect. In 1890, his name became well known in these circles when he won an award for classical architecture. At the time Glasgow was a dismal place and he decided to create his own identity by giving back something to the city. He basically  designed a series of individual building projects all over the city in his unique style most of which are open to the public. He wanted to use classical designs that he had learned about but develop something Scottish and unique looking to the future. Not only did he oversee the building construction but he created the whole concept by designing the furniture as well. By doing this, he successfully created a Mackintosh brand. These days the floodgates have opened even further as his popularity is renowned outside Glasgow thanks to the jewellery range.

I left Glasgow Central station and made my way to the north west side of the city, taking photo 1 on the way, past the temporary exhibition space Maclellan Galleries with reference on the door to the nearest tourist site....

.. and arrived at my first destination just around the corner with some unusual street architecture in place.

The Glasgow School of Art was Charles Rennie Macintosh's second last building and as he was running out of time, he was now wanting to leave legacies behind. Unfortunately he was only given a budget of £14,000 as the authorities wanted a simple building, so he could only complete a quarter of the building. Little did they know that he had greater plans for upstairs later.

My 1 hour tour started at 12 midday but unfortunately I was not allowed to take any interior photos due to it being a working Art school involving copyright rules and with this in mind, i'll give you as brief overview. Mackintosh plays architectural tricks on the mind by building a structure with an ancient English Arts and Craft roof with a mixture of Japanese influenced contemporary fittings, hanging ceilings, false supporting beams, adjacent dark and light spaces, inverting ideas such as reaching the top of the stairs, instead of being a place of brightness, it was almost dungeon like, then walking along a corridor, we entered a white Pavilion where the light brightened up the place.... Inspiration for the Art students of the day. One such idea on the staircase was Glasgow marble which was essentially polished concrete, an idea used 60 years later.  The library was his masterpiece... totally made of wood with numerous un supporting posts, it is thought to represent a forest with the central area being a clearing in the forest. The wood idea is thought to come from the process that books are made out of paper from trees from the forest. To give you an insight, heres a google images link to the library and other images plus exterior views.

Across the street, there was a different take on Art showing a Glasgow pastime and things important to them !!

After a few exterior photographs... in the rain, it was time to go for lunch and seeing I was on a themed day, I would visit another of Mackintosh's buildings.........

The price of the Chilli beef swung it for me whereas I've only ever paid more for a cup of tea at Babbington tea rooms, Spanish steps in Rome !!  To be fair, the teapot came with extra water and tea strainer and despite thinking that there's only so much tea that you can drink.... the spicyness of the Chilli made sure I drank it all !!
On arrival, I expected the real posh Mackintosh chairs at the front of the shop upstairs from the Jewellers.

.... but when I was asked if I had a reservation.... err no...  I had to sit with the majority of the diners in the more simple surroundings to the rear. See if you spot the rear of the tea rooms by the chair design. I wasn't going to miss an opportunity like this as I was a paying customer so I managed to find an excuse to go to the toilet upstairs and quickly photograph something of the front tea room without being caught by the waitress. It wasn't quite the picture I wanted as the tall seats were to the side of the room.

After lunch I walked to Cowcaddens underground station to take the train to the west end of the city...

The system, known as the subway, was opened in 1896 and is the third oldest in the world. It is a simple circular line around the city with the two railway tracks for identification and directional purposes being known as the inner and outer circle. The trains have a round cross section and are quite are low in height making it impossible to stand anywhere else except the middle of the train. They are usually of a certain bright colour and with the circular shape of the the network, it is sometimes known as the "Clockwork Orange". However the one I got today advertised Scottish poet Robert Burns...

My next destination was Kelvingrove Art gallery and Museum. It was a long time since I was last here as I didn't find the exhibits very interesting at the time.

The museum was opened in 1901 and it was decided by the council to close it for a few years for a re - fit and to make it more user friendly. It re-opened in 2006 after three years closure and a total spend of just under £28 million pounds. As the weather wasn't great today, this was an ideal opportunity to see an indoor building I saw once many years ago.

Even today, after all the re-fitting work I seemed more fascinated by the building than some of it's exhibits.....

two with a birds eye view

Eventually, I exhausted the building and myself with it's size and it was time to leave, so it was back over a bridge...

..that had some lights on it, a quick look at the Autumn tinged Glasgow University building.....

... and then to join fellow travellers on the subway back into to the city centre...

Glasgow is famous for having two shopping areas, Argyle Street and Sauchiehall Street (where I was earlier in the day), linked together by a third street shown below. Most are standard UK stores but there are a few exceptions to the rule that make shopping interesting to those who like that sort of thing.

Lastly, as the shops were now closing and my train was at 6pm (incidentally you may remember that I photographed my train also on the last post ), I used up some of my time in the tourist information centre looking for future ideas !!. As with most souvenir shops in Scotland, the merchandise on sale as you may have seen previously in my "Tyndrum and Loch Awe 1 - Power station" post is embarrassing.

The Loch Ness monster is a long way from home here so it is time to leave for the station and say goodbye to this distant colourful friend...