Duncan Harley

Along with perhaps a few million other folk, I can fairly claim to have visited the MacIntosh Building at Glasgow Art School, albeit a few decades ago. It was a fleeting visit. A school friend was studying at the place and I called round to help carry some paintings to a venue at the top of Sauchiehall street where said paintings were due to be exhibited. I have completely forgotten the name of the gallery, but I do recall being somewhat awed by the MacIntosh Building. Of course, in those days, and we are talking 1970’s here, I had no real idea of the extant heritage. In fact, I had never even heard of Rennie MacIntosh and I suppose that I was not alone since not once in my decade living and working in Mungo’s fair city did I hear even a breath of civic pride regarding the man’s humongous legacy. I suppose it was all down to the grinding cultural poverty of the day and perhaps a fixation by the the city fathers on the precariously coupling lines: Here's the bird that never flew...

It’s almost as if someone has it in for Rennie MacIntosh. Not only is Hill House over at Helensburgh falling to bits, but this weekend his quite splendid creation in Glasgow’s Scott Street has - for the second time in less than half a decade – burned to the ground. Hill House escaped the attentions of the young men of the Luftwaffe although my great aunties flat in nearby Kilmacolm suffered a near miss and records indicate that around 80% of Clydebank’s housing stock was destroyed or badly damaged in the onslaught. Indeed, around 600 folks were killed during just two nights of terror bombing in 1941. The NTS of course nowadays look after Hill House and charge folk a tenner to look at it. Good luck to them is all I can say. As for the MacIntosh Building at the Glasgow Art School, I have much more sympathy. The NTS plans to enclose Hill House within a plastic ‘shield’ are just plain silly and I am sure the man himself would agree. But, the art school building could maybe have ben...