Glasgow, 2 - 14 Sauchiehall Street, Royal Scottish Concert Hall

ARCHITECT: Sir Leslie Martin & RMJM Scotland 1990

Replaces St Andrew's Hall (destroyed by fire 1962), and coincides with the Glasgow European City of Culture Year (1990). Located at junction of Sauchiehall Street and Buchanan Street, in close association with new Buchanan Street shopping complex. Built in 864 days, handed over 26 August 1990. Opened 5 October in the presence of HRH The Princess Royal. Intended to accomodate conferences, stage productions, dancing, and indoor sports. Comprises two-level auditorium, foyer exhibition area, conference suite, and restaurant. Auditorium seats 1,130 in stalls and 1,1030 in horseshoe balcony; seating for 260 to rear of stage. Designed for full orchestral use, splayed at lower level with rectangular volume above balcony level. Ceiling formed by deep triangular structural steel roof trusses, designed to be acoustically transparent to allow roof void to contribute to sound volume. Reflective side walls and quadratic residue diffusers employed to control sound diffusion. Building serviced by central plantroom over conference suite, acoustically separated from auditorium in structurally independent enclosure designed to minimise noise transfer. Auditorium segment of building borne on 450 elastometric anti-vibration mountings owing to proximity of Queen Street railway station to east and Glasgow Underground line passing 18m below. Buff-coloured Yorkshire sandstone cladding. Front to Killermont Street features twin porticos and long windows, resembling Senate of Rome University (1932) by Piacentini. South facing entrance fronted by open rotunda of steps. Foyers and staircases lined in Italian marble and plaster.Terracotta carpeting in auditorium, contrasting with dark blue seating and light ash veneered panels on walls. Two murals in lower foyer by Ian McCulloch. Glass curtain wall added to staircase facing up Sauchiehall Street, 1998. Fibrous plaster baffles installed on ceiling by Sandy Brown Associates to address acoustical problems (removed 1997).

Prospect 1990; RIAS 1990; J Rodger 1999