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Archaeology Notes

Event ID 772496

Category Descriptive Accounts

Type Archaeology Notes

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/772496

NS56NW 36.00 548 660

NS56NW 36.01 54687 66164 Giant Cantilever Crane

NS56NW 36.02 547 661 New Fabrication Shed (Kvaerner Govan Shipyard)

Fairfield Shipbuilding Yard and Engine Works, 1048 Govan Road. Founded 1863 by Randolph & Elder, engineers and iron shipbuilders. Though the yard has been extensively reconstructed within the past ten years, the large rectangular engine works, a high single-storey brick building with cast iron columns in the interior and pairs of pilasters at intervals along the sides, is unaltered (completed c. 1874).

The main office block, a particularly fine French Renaissance two-storey, 39-bay structure with a tower at the rear, was built in 1889 (J Keppie of Honeyman & Keppie, architects). The main office entrance, round-headed, with low relief sculpture, is flanked by statues of a shipwright and a mariner, each standing on the prow of a ship. The three-storey offices in Elder St. were added in 1903.

J R Hume 1974.

The Fairfield yard of Govan Shipbuilders Ltd. faces Elder Park. A long red sandstone ashlar office block by John Keppie of Honeyman & Keppie (1888-91) screens the shipyard; the style is Italian Renaissance. On the first floor, two continuous strips of window light the drawing offices; between them, a staircase window within the central temple front. Statues of a shipwright and an engineer stand on stylised ships' prows flanking the doorway. Three-storey offices in Elder Street, 1903. Art Deco W block of 1940 by G Bestwick. NW of this, the fine engine works of 1874 with pilastered brick walls which conceal a magnificent interior of massive cast-iron stanchions and raking stays, deep wrought-iron crane girders and substantial pine roof trusses.

E Williamson, A Riches and M Higgs 1990.

People and Organisations

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