The final stretch

nearly out of the park and Fish market clock tower beckons through the gloom, in the foreground on the left is The High Court and snuggled next to it on the right is the famous Glasgow Mortuary



It can`t claim to be one of Glasgow`s finer corner tenements, but Shipbank on the corner of Briggait and Saltmarket is certainly one of the more famous. It still boast an onion dome corner, and an intact wrap around victorian pub exterior!



I pass by and head down Paddies Loan and stop and click fast Eddie



I exit Paddies on Clyde Street and finally capture the south facing side of the fablous Fish market building from the middle of the street, no traffic in sight.



Facing it across the river is The Glasgow Mosque, with its eye of a needle minarate. It looks almost ok in the fog. But I know that when the fog clears so will my mind. It is one of my least favourite buildings in the city.
It looks like a cross between a B & Q shed and a sixties RAF aerodrome control tower. It was apparently donated to the local Muslim community by a Sheik from Saudi Arabia. I can only imagine that at the time he must have been wearing darker glasses than those guys tended to wear in those days!
I dont know if it adheres to islamic geometry, it certainly dosen`t look like it.
The glazed dome is to say the least unfortunate and looks as if it were glazed in polycarbonate.
Suggestion: tear it down, find another Sheik, maybey that guy who is building the tallest building in the world in downtown Dubai, and a really good architect who understands the disipline of Islamic Design.



A view doon the water Calton Place on the left Carrick Quay on the right before it dissapears and in the misty distance the suspension foot bridge, romantic or what!



A view up the toon of the romantic sun gilded mansions of commerce, education and power. The Stockwell never looked prettier than it did this morning!, no traffic and virtually no people, what more could you want!!!

Past the boathouse and back to the studio

Still the home of Glasgow`s rowing club and remarkably untagged at the moment the building makes a romantic statement at the riverside.



However I think it needs jazzed up a bit, mabey take a chance and finish off the tagger magnet white finish and dare I say commission us to do some contemporary glass for those round windows, and or move the building up to the Peoples Palace to benefit from the magnificant security.
Now that would give these rower chappies the opportunity to walk down to the river with their boats over their heads as they love to do.
Look how popular penguin walk is at Edinburgh Zoo.
Is Glasgow City Council missing an opportunity here!

The tree lined river walk

Time to head back, west along the river side.
I get a misty view of The Gorbals, Donald MacBean once asked me what a Gorbal was, I am not misty eyed about a tower block though the mist romances it!



Heres an unusal site, a life ring in place, like the Doulton fountain people are always throwing these into the river Clyde for sport.
Well I suppose its better than football violence, yes it does still go on, or mugging old women, and yes that still goes on too!
Yes we are becoming more civilised and kinder and less racist and even more cultured, but lets face it if you fall into the river these days the only thing that may save you is this



or this



and with George Parsonage retiring and no one replacing him as yet, I think the second option may be the only one in future.
But a word of caution, they are like the busses, you can wait for one all day and then theres a whole flock of them.



A bit of Gothic treescape



and the big stump, the boathouse looms in the distance!



Big Stump detail, will it grow again?

Up the Misty Mountain

I have been dying to fit the above title in all day.
Glasgow City Councils new money spinning venture (what you thought it was moved for its own safety!) is as they say "fair coining it in".
The apparent miracelous recovery and trancendental movement (I mean who actually saw it move from its previous location to where it is now) is driving people from all corners of the globe desperate to chuck hard earned cash into the fountain for good luck.
It has been rumoured that a three legged woman from Mongolia, spontaniously grew a fourth after throwing in a ten pence piece.
It has got to such a fever pitch, as you can see, that the council have installed security to keep an eye on the dosh that gets chucked in.
I can verify its efficency, a voice boomed out requesting that I get out of the fountain outer perimeter, that I had been captured on camera and I was only taking photos!
What would have happened if I had tried to grab a handful of wet dosh, would a death ray have emanated from the rather sinister Cupola dome at the top of the Peoples Palace and fried me to a crisp.
All I can say is watch out Lourdes!

Pan Plays

Pan plays his mischevious tune and probably mischeviously designed the yellow thingy in the background. Dont`t ask me what its meant to be.
I was going to wait till it was finished and go back and have a look, to see how it fitted in.
But you know me! a mouth crammed with feet.
Could it be?
1. a structure
2. a homage to the song`s "Tie a yellow ribbon round the old oak tree" or that wonderful old John Wayne standard that we all sang in the back courts many years ago "She wore! She wore! She wore a yellow ribbon"
3. Built in the wrong place
4. a replacement bright yellow doulton fountain thats screams to the tagger, paint me! paint me! I like this one.

Its meaning is bound to be filled with architectural irony, it is after all quite an old architectural idea which seems to be getting pummeled to death these days for want of better ideas.
I hold my baited breath!

Doulton Details. The trappings of Empire

First we have South Africa, land of the free or was it voor!



Next we have Canada, full of those pesky French and disenfranshised Scots, well those that survived the crossing.



Next up! The Indian sub-continent. They gave us polo and on our way out we gave them a border dispute. Good old Lord Louis Mountbatten and his trusty pen, I bow before a superior map maker!



Last but not least its the biggest island in the world, Australia. We used to send the bad guys there! Nowadays it appears to be becoming a bastion of staunch racism, if you want to learn how to become an even better racist then look no further than Australia. Landless Scots and Irish were also sent there during the potato famines, with a wonderful article in the London Times (of the period) extolling their virtues, still ringing in their ears.



A homage to the gallant troops of empire, the future fodder of the Somme!

Lookin` for a fountain, A Doulton Fountain

I spy through the gloom! Its the Peoples Palace, cumone Elspeth n`Michael gonnay cum hame, surely all must be forgiven by now!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I know! I`m just an old sentimentalist!



A tree being held back by the stalwart fence around the peoples palace, and just as well too!, we dont`t want that sort of riff-raff clogging up our museums, unless its conceptual of course and filled with irony!



Conceptual red path and tree composition next to peoples palace.



I knew it had been moved and figured it had to be at the peoples palace.
It had lain in dissaray for years at the triumphal entrance to the Green.
It had been slowly but shurely chibbed by us glaswegians to within a breath of its very existence. But lets face it, if its still here how could it possibly be a thing of beauty! The attitude permeates everything, Glasgow and Scotland keep their pedestals empty.
Need an architect for a parliament, a glass artist for a light house, a mosicaist for an art gallery, a shop fitter for a pub, there can`t possibly be anyone good enough up here.
Rant over!!!!!

Finally restored and relocated for its own safety the Magnificiant Doulton Fountain

Back on Terra Firma

safely back in Glasgow Green, I head towards our very own Cleopatras needle, how many of the bloddy things did she have!



I take another misty tree and path shot, they are everywhere screaming take me!, take me!. I am weak willed and click!



But up close to the needle I spy this lovely little family grouping.
Ma, Pa and the wean, but I think a cuckoo has visited this nest!

Oh no! Its the Ushida Findlay Building again!

Even though from this angle it looks some what like a large art deco surgical boot left behind by a crippled giant, I still sort of like this building.



In stark contrast, across from it is this delicate contemporary town house, reminescent of the victorian redsandstone Italianate mansions that can be found all around Glasgow.



However! Stuck on to the side of it is this rather unfortunate conglomeration of glass, reminiscent of guts spilling out of the building into a cauldron of tripe (sheep stomach).
Could one be forgiven for thinking that the Architect had little understanding of how decorative glass could be used in an architectural scheme.
Or was it just another example of,
"Oh fuck! we still have Percent for Art money to spend! Quick!, somebody get me the Yellow Pages!"



On the way out and back to the green I spot this nice detail in the Ushida Findlay Building. But I still don`t think this building will wear well



A nice view of the cascading gardens of the Ushida Findlay Building.

I spot the misty mansions

Through the gloom at the northern edge of the park I spy the strutting outline of Homes for the Future. I decide to pay another brief visit!





Now you would think that with the impending oil crisis thats been looming for the past 30 years, that architects and developers would have started making provision for bicycle storage. Seems not!



I head up the staircase and come into this pleasing space.

Through the Ark de triump

Well thats what its called locally amongst other things.
A magnificant entrance way, into what is still one of the finest publically owned spaces in Europe.

On to the Green

I claw my way through the fog of Briggait and finally reach Shipbank corner, I cross the Saltmarket in a leisurly fashion, nae traffic!, and head towards the Green.

Sneeking a look at paddies

The car park is deserted as I stride nimbly through it. If you ever need a parking space in Glasgow then I can thoroughly reccomend it as having plenty of space available all christmas day!
I look across Brigait and paddies market is completly deserted, mabey thats where the barratt building is going, blanket on the ground, "1 appartment block for sale 50p and I`ll throw in the Slaters Building for £ 20 million!"

I cut through the car park and see a monster

I`m out the door, like a rat out the trap!
it`s about 11.30 AM and its a heavy fog, all thats missing is the snow, or else we would have had a truely winter wonderland!
The air is sharp and theres ice underfoot as I head into King Street Carpark.
I turn around to photograph the studio, but its too depressing, its christmas after all!
But the prow of the Barratt building (Regency Apartments) looms up through the fog like some Monty Pythonesque beast and I notice its got Slaters Building in tow in the background. I wonder where they could be going, and hope its not Glasgow Green!

I walked out one misty morning

Its Christmas 2005, and so far its gone predictably as usual.
To quote a dear friend, "Hooray!"
Apart, that is, from the mist that greeted me through the window this morning!
A white christmas indeed.
So whats a boy to do?, well go out and photograph it of course.
But where? oh! where?
I took the easy option, Glasgow Green, you can`t go wrong with fog and trees!!
By the way I can sell you Glasgow`s famous public green for a pittance and you can build anything on it that you like, honest guv!