Glasgow Buildings - Ingram Street

Alex Glass · Glasgow Buildings - Ingram Street

Ingram Street

The spine of the New Town, originally closed to the High Street and terminated to the west by the Royal Exchange to which it runs ‘straight as a sunbeam... and at its furthest extremity is teminated by a very handsome building with an open court and wings adorned with all the ornament that the Grecian architecture can bestow’. The handsome building was the mansion of Cunninghame of Lainshaw in Queen Street, now reclothed as the Royal Exchange. A spacious, broad concourse, it was graced with important civic monuments: the Ramshorn Kirk, the Athenaeum, Hutchesons’ Hospital, the Star Inn, the New County Buildings, some good banks, and the Royal Exchange.

St David’s (Ramshorn) Kirk,
98 Ingram Street, 1824, Thomas Rickman

The English architect who first classified medieval church architecture into styles, Rickman was employed to replace an unfashionable 18th-century God box; which he did in academic Early Decorated, in a squeezed, vertically proportioned cruciform building. Town Superintendent James Cleland inserted the crypt and altered the staircase, making the church stand higher than originally intended. The principal mercantile memorials to Glasgow are divided between this spooky graveyard (built originally upon the cherry and apple trees, gooseberry and currant bushes, kaill, leeks and other ground herbs belonging to Hutchesons’ Hospital) and the Necropolis. The original burying ground was clipped severely when laying out the widened Ingram Street.

Stuball

The graveyard behind the Ramshorn is a true 'oasis' in the city now. With the large buildings that surround it on 3 sides, most day to day noises are cut off from entering giving it a peaceful, relaxed feeling. No drone of traffic makes it an ideal place to hide away from the world to eat a working lunch or have a quiet chat with friends.

(note: I only have night shots at the moment, but will change that soon)

Alex Glass · Ingram Square

Ingram Square
From 1982, Elder & Cannon

The name given to the entire block between the Candleriggs and Brunswick Street. A variety of other houses and warehouses are knit together with an outstanding new one to form a square of flats and shops. The Candleriggs corner is occupied by Descartes, a steel-framed inter-war warehouse with characteristic large-pained windows. The rest of the Ingram Street frontage, and most of upper Brunswick Street, is occupied by the fascinating 1854 facades by R W Billings. Billing’s books Baronial and Ecclesiastical Antiquities of Scotland were primarily responsible for the Victorian Baronial revival, although here he eschewed revivalism himself. His crisp, finely detailed and eccentric facades owe little to historic Scots precedent: Dutch gables, reinterpreted turrets, oriel windows and string courses are pure invention. Indeed, his building further down Brunswick Street, with its aversion to any right angle, could almost be said to presage the buildings of Rudolph Steiner.

The Burrell Company

Ingram Square, Glasgow

The redevelopment of fourteen existing buildings within the heart of Glasgow’s Merchant City was one of the most significant events in the regeneration of the whole of central Glasgow. Initiated by Kantel the development was undertaken by a joint venture company established with Glasgow District Council and the Scottish Development Agency. The initial drawings were by Kantel and included some elaborate treatments for the new-build elements by Andy Bow. However architectural consistency was introduced by the retention of Elder & Cannon to work up the whole scheme and deliver the successful phases. In total the development delivered 240 flats, student accommodation, offices, 20 shops, parking for 108 cars and a large communal garden.

The building which set the whole thing in motion was formerly known as the Houndsditch, a ‘B’ Listed, early Victorian academic exercise dating from 1854, designed by John Baird and R W Billings. The latter’s considerable fame as an architectural historian, with a particular interest in traditional Scottish buildings, is evident in the highly unusual treatment of the building’s original facades.

The Houndsditch presented particular challenges. Ultimately it was reworked as a facade retention with three storeys set behind the retained frontages onto Brunswick and Ingram Streets. The scale rises to four storeys facing onto the courtyard and garden behind. This internal space also gives onto a substantial subterranean car park.

As it evolved the significance of Ingram Square towards re-establishing a vibrant residential community within central Glasgow was increasingly recognised. The various warehouse buildings which had been rescued from dereliction si alongside infill sections which, while displaying the resolutely post-modern attribute of the mid 1980’s, are carefully judged in scale and form against their neighbour and achieve the notable trick of re-introducing brick to a major Glasgow city central scheme without jarring.

Ingram Square’s significance for Glasgow and indeed in the wider UK context was acknowledged in two major cover features in the Architects’ Journal and in numerous awards. It also prompted a whole series of listed building residential refurbishments. It does not seen too much to boast that this project was the first major step in regenerating what has become a major leisure and tourism focus for Glasgow – and of its most popular residential areas- The Merchant City.

Alex Glass

Nice work Stu

Keep it coming.

Stuball

True to my word, I return with pictures of the graeyard in daylight!

First, a little more information on the Ramshorn... the legend behind the name comes from the time of St. Mungo where a thief stole a ram from the Bishops flock. When he cut off the rams head, it petrified and became stuck to his hand, unable to remove it. The thief confessed his sin to St. Mungo who gave him absolution and the ram was given to the thief as a gift. The location of this occurence was then known as 'Lands of Ramshorn'

The graveyard is the oldest in Glasgow dating back to Georgian times covering land which is now covered by Ingram Street. Many of Glasgows merchants from late 18th and 19th centuries like within the graveyard. The graveyard was plagued by 'resurrectionists' who would dig up freshly buried bodies for medical research, thus tall spiked cages were installed around some graves to deter. Some of the graves still have these cages in place. There was also an iron mortsafe within the ground which housed a body for a couple of months allowing it to decompose (now can be viewed in the Peoples Palace). Finally, all of the gravestones lie horizontally due to a regulation in place that forbaid any stone to be 9 inches above the nearby road! (Be sure to check out the graves for strangers and the wording on some markers such as 'property of...'!)

To view the photo set and/or comment, set viewable by CLICKING HERE

Alex Glass · Hutchesons' Hall

Hutchesons' Hall

Ingram Street, 1802
David Hamilton

In this splendid delicate-almost-French-design (modified internally by John Baird II in 1876), the young Hamilton gave clear notice of his future stature as one of Glasgow’s greatest architects. The principal storey is recessed behind Corinthian columns, and flanked by bays containing statues of James Hutcheson and George Hutcheson carved in 1655 by James Colquhoun (who, as well as being an artist, invented Glasgow’s first fire engine, and ended up a Bailie.) The attic is decorated with sculpture and a balustrade, and the tower proceeds gracefully from square, to drum, to conical as it gets higher. Smaller rooms and offices on the ground floor, fine staircase to piano nobile or principal floor and Baird’s hall, with its huge windows, wonderfully idiosyncratic pediments, and rich plasterwork. Good ironwork. Converted by Jack Norman to the West of Scotland HQ for the National Trust for Scotland.

Part of the Merchant City Heritage Trail

Stuball

I have some further information at home about Hutchesons' from a book published by and for Hutchesons' grammer school.... might see if I can get some deep nitty gritty when my mum returns to work at the school

Alex Glass

Look forward to hearing what you find out Stu.

I am sure I should be able to find out more as well but will need to see what I have already.

Alex Glass

More buildings on Ingram Street