Glasgow, 125 Niddrie Road, Langside Synagogue

A two-storey, roughly T-plan former synagogue designed by Waddell & Young, 1926-1927, with interior features by Harris Berkowitch, cabinetmaker. The building incorporates a mixture of neo-Romanesque and neoclassical styles. It is located on Niddrie Road, near the intersection of Queen's Drive, a principal road through the residential area of Crosshill. The principal elevation is of coursed rubble sandstone with ashlar panels and dressings. The other elevations are rendered. (Historic Environment Scotland List Entry)

Langside Synagogue was established on Langside Road in 1915. The synagogue moved here to 125 Niddrie Road, to a design by architects Jeffrey Waddell & Young with a Romanesque style façade. It re-opened in 1927. The building has a traditional immigrant shul interior. The Ark (two-tiers made of timber and gilding in traditional Eastern European style), bimah and decorative details including the clock on the gallery front were carved by a Lithuanian-born cabinet-maker called Harris Berkovitch (c. 1876–1956), who was a member of the congregation. Woodcarving and wall-painting in folk-art style was a characteristic of synagogue building particularly in Poland, Ukraine, and Romania. The tall upper tier includes large gilded Luhot (Tablets of the Law) with painted glass panels to either side, and the pediment contains a Keter Torah (Crown of the Torah) with gilded sunrays, both motifs found in traditional Jewish art. It is one of the only two (the other being in London) truly Eastern European-style synagogue interiors in Britain. (Information from South Glasgow Heritage Environment Trust website).