Publicity

futureglasgow provides an extensive photographic archive of Glasgow and its environs, work which we have had published in newspapers, architectural journals and online. We also perform freelance work, offering extensive local knowledge with a personal touch to suit your needs. Our experience encompasses CAD drawings, journalism, web design and covers for several major novels and biographies.

Prospect 136 : Published 29/09/09

Union Square division - A planning battle is underway as oil magnate Sir Ian Wood offers to put Ł40m into a new Aberdeen Square.
Mo town low down – The largest mobile crane in Europe is hard at work hoisting sections of the new M74 into place.
RMJM go for gold – A look at the hurdles faced by RMJM as the practice starts detailed design for the Commonwealth Games Athletes Village.
Static travellers – Its show time between travelers and GCC as the authority seeks to clear sites in advance of the Commonwealth Games.
Going with the flow – He is the most ignored man you‘ll ever meet. But two teams in Glasgow and Edinburgh decided what would happen if you paid attention to the The Red Man.
School rules – Of all challenges in architecture there are perhaps none greater than schools provision, we look at how the Scottish Futures Trust aims to address these challenges.

M77 view : Published : 13/08/09

Shettleston : Published : 07/08/09

Cathcart : Published : 12/07/09

Capella Views : Published 21/06/09
Hearts fluttered early in the cladding of Capella when a pane of glass was found shattered in its frame, fears of faulty glazing were allayed however when it was discovered a ball had been punted at the innocent glass. Capella sports high grade clear glazing throughout with a red tinted overlay, a difficult sell to conservative and cash conscious developers. A dramatic curving screen of glass dominates views to the south east and addresses a public square at the centre, bulbous rather than indented it reflects light down into a sheltered pocket park.

Prospect 135 : Published 22/05/09

The travels of comrade Stallan – Paul Stallan looks at architecture and opportunity within the former Soviet republic.
Saving Down Towns – Why are so many towns in decline and what can be done to help?
Glenrothes report – A look at how the Plook on the Plinth winner can be remodeled.
New Cumnock report – How to entice visitors to come knock on New Cumnock's door
Rubble trouble – Prospect is creating an organisation called The Rubble Club for buildings demolished in their architects lifetime.
Swish fish – A look inside Glasgow's newest eaterie, from architect and restauranteur John MacLeod.
Villa thriller – The winner of Prospect's LEGO challenge is revealed, and the runners up from Aedas, Gareth Hoskins Architects, gm+ad, Michael Gilmour Associates and RMJM. Images copyright Mark Seager.

Glasgow Images : Published 29/03/09

Cuprum Views : Published 12/03/09

Prospect 134 : Published 03/03/09

In Springs Prospect we root out Scotland's most down town, settle into Kirsty Wark's "happy place", see how Speir's Locks is on the Make, delve deep into Murray's World, shine a light on some illuminating displays and get the low down on the canal networks latest and greatest sculpture - straight from the horses mouth.

The Carbuncles : Published 07/12/08

Scotland on Sunday article on the Carbuncle awards.

Prospect 133 : Published 03/12/08

In Winters Prospect we High Five Jumeirah Hotels arrival in Glasgow, reveal how a Lighthouse can hit the rocks and establish the first century of players in the built environment. We go back to school at Hazelwood, Andy McMillan and Tom Connolly reveal some home truths and it's the Don of a new era in Aberdeen. Gareth Hoskins Architects Venice zenith is explored and a virtual future is revealed.

Alien Wars : Published 29/11/2008
Official site

Latest

Breaking News
Engineers have successfully broken through the outer hull of the crashed craft, which appears entirely inert but for one low level power source traced to a hold area in the bowels of the ship. The scarcophogus like structure, cold to the touch, is conjectured to represent some form of cryogenic storage device. The military for their part maintain that sufficient firepower has been put in place to deal with any eventuality.

A heated debate is said to have erupted amongst the investigating team with factions calling for a release mechanism to be activated. It is reasoned contact with any sentient life represents the only way the complex scrawls of hieroglyphs within the craft can be deciphered and knowledge gleaned of the advanced technology contained within. Others sage that hasty moves now prior to properly establishing the origin, motive and designs of the vessel may prove unwise.

This schism was put in sharp relief earlier this afternoon when assistant technician O'Brien was spotted scampering from a side door. The haggard boffin upon finding his passage blocked by the throng of waiting press chose to ignore tabled questions and instead shouted into the middle distance: He's mad, mad I say... stroking it, he SPEAKS with it... low chuckle... well this puppy isn't going to play... incoherent muttering... THE DEVIL POSSESSES!!

With that the wild eyed prof lunged passed the curious crowd of onlookers and careened down Argyle Street, disrupting traffic and narrowly avoiding collision before staggering into a cab thought to be bound for the airport. A written statement was later issued on behalf of Chief Science Officer Evans by the military press attache, clearing up the confusion...
The disturbing scenes witnessed earlier today were shocking but sadly not unexpected. O'Brien's erratic behaviour is evidence of a troubled mind festering malcontent at being passed over for promotion. His contract has been terminated. My team and I remain united in our determination to secure the safe exhumation of the craft and its contents for the benefit of all mankind and I assure the public that all necessary precautions are being taken. We have a world class team of scientists on site and I ask for calm as we pursue our common goal.

Published 26/11/2008
A heavy military and police presence around Central Station has stoked ongoing rumours that excavation work in the blocked off basement area of The Arches has uncovered something unusual, apparently now corroborated in a recent press statement by an Arches spokesperson.

An Alien Spacecraft discovered in the basement of the Arches has been quarantined by the British Army who are now patrolling the site.

Archaeologists have been baffled thus far by inconclusive radio carbon dating, leaving the experts in a quandry as to the likely veracity of the find other than to intimate that surrounding geology indicates that the craft has been buried for many millenia. In the interim the public are asked not to panic or impede the work of government agencies. Scientists stress that any entity capable of such technological prowess is unlikely to be malevolent in nature and would in any event have perished over such a prolonged period without nourishment. As a precautionary measure however the quarantine period will remain in effect until Dec 6 whereupon the venue owner hopes to capitalise on the find by organising small trips of sightseers to the site, strictly by accompaniment with military personnel only.

Leaked accounts from the scene cite: You know it could come from anywhere, above, below, a duct, that dark corner... but you know it will come!!, another warns: Fear hangs heavy in the air as strobe lights and screeching sirens hammer home the chilling warning that we are at war... these reports have already been dismissed however as further evidence of media scaremongering and tabloid excess.

The Fat Man : Published 09/11/08
Official site

A fresh chapter in The Fat Man sees the eponymous glaswegian MI5 agent embroiled in an international hunt for the mysterious "Tegel Project", said to have been one of Hitler's wonder weapons of WW2. The device is rumoured to provide a functional temporal technology, a time machine, but with no hard evidence to substantiate the tale it was lost to history... until that is The Fat Man finds himself having a bemused conversation with his future self. The incident does not go unnoted in London where senior figures scheme to locate the device as a means of restoring Britain's full imperial vigour.

So begins a mad chase across Europe as The Fat Man seeks to elicit the truth, but with friend indistinguishable from foe can a mysterious cheese nibbling figure be trusted? "The Fat Man" - A free comic where all you have to do is read online to donate to charity - the more visitors the more the charity raises. The authors are actively seeking character models and participants are welcomed at the-fat-man@hotmail.co.uk. All profits will be donated to charity.

Responsible for the death of millions, the mysterious ‘Tegel Project’ threatens the very core of civilisation. Betrayed by MI5, the Fat Man finds himself caught between the blazing guns of would-be assassins and the blood-red lips of silent movie star Louise Brooks. Unable to trust anyone and faced with a series of unpalatable choices, he careers madly along the arch of time on the seemingly impossible mission of keeping himself and his lover alive.

USA 2008 : Published 23/11/08

New York
Fly to Newark and plant yourself in the left hand aisle for a ringside seat of Manhattan, reverse the strategy on the way out and you may be lucky enough to fly over Central Park.

Miami
An unintentional CSI homage sees us in the Southern boom town (and correspondingly priced) city of Miami. Beautiful weather, beautiful people and beautiful seas in this beach mecca. A snap decision takes us for a bite to eat in the gator theatre croc walk that is the Everglades.

Florida
Space shuttle Endeavour takes off for the International Space Station to repair a damaged solar array and facilitate enlarged six man crews. Seemingly half the eastern seaboard had turned up to see the last ever night launch with four hour traffic jams along local highways. Even outwith the 60 mile exclusion zone it is an incredible sight, an artificial sun rising into the night. The fleet will be decommissioned by 2010 leaving a capability gap until the planned Orion spacecraft enter service in 2014, vanguard to the ultimate goal of mounting a sequence of manned moon shots by 2020, finally opening a doorway to Mars.

Nevada
America's monument to the Great Depression is evocative of current travails, many of the highrises under construction in Las Vegas have stalled in the current credit jam. This hasn't hindered construction of the Hoover Dam Bypass however, posessor of the world's largest concrete arch bridge.

Andy McMillan and Tom Connolly in conversation

Prospect Magazine has brought together Andy McMillan and Tom Connolly, the architect of his home, for an evening’s insight into the history of this trend setting Merchant City development. The two men met as tutor and pupil at the Glasgow School of Art and are reunited here for the very first time. Join us for an intimate discourse on the remarkable friendship of these intriguing characters.

Skyline views

Prospect 132

In Autumns Prospect we have designs on Buchanan Street, looking at how this nodal throughfare is likely to evolve by 2020. We examine the impact of the ongoing "credit crunch" upon the development pipeline and offer an in depth analysis of the hotels sector which continues to scale new heights. See the impact public investment is having on the ground in Govan with our exclusive location report and read a summary of the design challenges presented by the ongoing terrorist threat.

All this and more in Prospect Issue 132, on sale now.

Future Glasgow : Published 15/07/2008

Dusk is settling on the end of an era at futureglasgow. It's been a fun ride these past three years charting the rise and rise of the city, but just as Glasgow evolves so must we. As of today all future news articles will break at Architecture Scotland in the first instance. I believe that by joining a team of like minded individuals we will be better placed to bring you development news from across Scotland and the north of England. In particular I will be available to answer queries daily on our dedicated forum.

Glasgow's future has never been brighter, the projects documented here represent the merest tip of an infinite future. I look forward to sharing that future with you there.

The Enforcer : Published 12/06/2008

futureglasgow met with Graeme Pearson for a photocall to illustrate his anticipated autobiography.

The Enforcer charts one mans rise through the ranks of Strathclyde Police to head The Scottish Crime and Drug Enforcement Agency. Adopting unique internal perspective of changed public perception of a force since transformed by the introduction of CCTV and DNA based evidence, Graeme bears witness to the ebb & flow of criminal activity through personal anecdote and insight in a remarkable career spanning 4 decades.

Throughout this time Graeme gives testimony to the urban disintegration of city districts maintaining vivid memories of housing along Charing Cross and life in tenemental quarters, retaining particular displeasure for Basil Spence's Hutchesontown having dealt with the subsequent social fallout at the frontline of the war on drugs. Acknowledging recent economic progress Graeme laments the relatively slow pace of change here in comparison to southern port cities. Under no illusions as to the situation in Liverpool, (a friend was subject to a car jacking on a recent visit) Graeme is nonetheless staggered by the pace of progress there and fears that recent wealth creation in Glasgow may not be sufficient to address endemic poverty.

The Enforcer: A Life Fighting Crime is published on 30 October.

Revit Project, Library & Learning Centre : Published 11/06/08

Architect - John Glenday
Cost - Ł20 million
Location - 1 Meadowside Street
Status - Vision

Tasked with designing a small scale commercial product, futureglasgow elected to proceed with a Library & Learning Centre on the banks of the Clyde at Glasgow Harbour. Preliminary investigation of the existing quality of library provision within the city identified 5 key areas from which it was felt significant improvement could be effected:

1. Architectural Design
2. Spatial Qualities
3. Technology
4. Function
5. Location

A full breakdown of these objectives can be read in the enclosed Design Statement.

Alba Town : Published 10/06/2008

futureglasgow was commissioned by Alba Town to develop an online marketing strategy for a suite of properties in the near east. Close liaison with client and brief saw introduction of the Merchant City e Campaign.

Nautical College Gallery : Published 12/05/2008

Latest

With thanks to the Nautical College for granting permission to film.

Red Alert : Published 12/05/2008

futureglasgow was asked to produce location material in support of one of Glasgow's best known novellists, Margaret Thomson Davis.
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Red Alert depicts the emotional turmoil underwent by the Price family as their lives are turned upside down following a horrific car accident. But all is not as it seems and the family must come to terms with a new nightmare as tangled allegiances and double dealings unfold in a conspiracy that will tear the family apart.

Red Alert is published on 30 September.

VR Glasgow : Published 25/02/2008

Ever wanted to swoop and soar above the city only to be thwarted by Newtonian physics? GCC's Terra Explorer and Google's Model Glasgow now offer free gravity defying alternatives. The Council's Ł450,000 urban model is currently the more populated although don't expect 5mm photo realism prior to roll out of super fast broadband. More interestingly Google's alternative provides scope for the artistically minded to generate and share their own Sketchup models via Google Earth, enquiries are directed to martin.rourke@gmail.com

Curious Rationalism : First published, 18th April 2006

Gordon Murray and Alan Dunlop Architects (gm+ad) requested inclusion of River Heights photography from futureglasgow to illustrate the development within a specially commissioned volume of the architects work, Gordon Murray and Alan Dunlop: Curious Rationalism.
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The Tribune : First published, Saturday, 11th March 2006

futureglasgow was contacted by the editor to provide data on development proposals within Glasgow circa 2015.

Skyscrapernews : First published, 12th August 2003

A short essay outlining the seeds of Glasgow's recovery written for Skyscrapernews. The UK and Ireland's largest tall buildings database and news source.

Websites written by futureglasgow

Glenrothes has been named the most dismal place in Scotland, in the 2009 Carbuncles Awards, beating off stiff competition from Motherwell in Lanarkshire and New Cumnock in Ayrshire. The infamous Plook-on-the-Plinth is now destined for the Fife New Town, which was singled out for particular criticism for its depressed, and investment starved town centre.

Gone but not forgotten: The Rubble Club is an organisation founded to remember buildings demolished in their architect’s lifetime. The Club has three key ground rules: Firstly the building’s architect must be alive and not party to its destruction, secondly the building must be built with the intention of permanence (exhibitions, shops and interiors are not eligible) and thirdly it must be deliberately destroyed or radically altered, it can’t simply burn down.

Britain's Best Buildings aims to highlight the best in the built environment throughout the UK. We encourage anyone - from the general public through to industry professionals - to submit projects of architectural merit. The buildings will form the basis of an online repository of cutting edge British architecture of which a selection will be published in a series of regional books, commencing with the north west.

A link agreement exists between futureglasgow and Clyde Waterfront - Urban Renewal Project

City Palace : Published 23/01/08

Developer - S&T Equity (Overseas) Ltd
Architect - RMJM
Materials -
Height - 45 Floors
Build cost -
Location - Moscow City, Russia
Status -
Start date -
Completion date - 2010

City Palace is a distinctive twisting form housing civic registry offices alongside commercial office space, the design of which is touted as a unique Russo-British collaboration and symbol of Russia's newfound wealth and prosperity. The tower defines a growing sense of dignity in the Russian people brought about by a flood of petro dollars to a once moribund nation. Politically too the project marks a rare example of Russian/British collaboration within the context of a deteriorating relationship at leadership level. City Palace may illustrate a new found freedom of architectural expression but it does so within the confines of an autocratic society and associated climate of fear.

The site benefits from favourable vantage within the "Moscow City" district of the Russian capital occupying a key position alongside the Moskva river and enjoying direct line of sight to the historic centre some 4km distant. Marrying undoubted artistic and negotiating skill with perseverance through fraught economic cycles have seen RMJM win the competition not once, not twice but thrice in a tale stretching back to 1998.

Benefitting from a client keen to push boundaries the scheme is a reaction to the fall of Communism and product of the resultant groundswell of public disgust at a modernist movement foisted on the city by Soviet overlords. The resultant spiral geometry cleverly stacks commercially favourable square floor plates around a circular core purportedly redolent of a whole raft of natural, architectural and biological influences, ranging from a couples embrace, intertwined ribbons, the double helix of DNA and the swirling onion domes of the Kremlin. Everything it seems but the true genesis of it all, Malmo's Turning Torso. Such superficial similarity is however brushed aside by well rehearsed argument detailing localised symbolism of "marriage" and "family". Is this archi babble froth or product of detailed local research of culture and use? The evidence is to the latter but an honest admission of influential rivals would not have gone amiss.

Fittingly for a nation with highest rates of marriage (and divorce), City Palace will contain a wedding chapel as part of its planning gain, the resultant civic space funded from the commercial tower. Keen to dignify what can be a conveyor belt of identikit ceremonies, the hall will employ the powerful visual presence of the tower above to awe those below through glass skylights. The resultant downpouring of light is promised to be in constant flux such that no two weddings will experience the same quality of light. Presumably overcast day's will be reserved for divorce.

From inception light has played an integral role in shaping the design and focussing thought. Each facet of glass is offset against the next and each floor is rotated through 3 degrees. The resultant sheath of rippling glass produces a unique kaleidoscope of refracted and reflected light that traces the sun's trajectory deep within the office interior. It is perhaps appropriate then that a stray ray of sunlight should have illuminated RMJM's display at a critical planning session. Whether divine inspiration in a religously freed society or fortunate astronomical conjunction this foretaste of the refractive power of light proved illuminating for the flamboyant mayor of Moscow, Yury Luzhkov. Having seen the light as it were he was prompted to remark "looks like a beautiful woman in a sea of men". Lack of familiarity with Yury's past flames mean this comment cannot be accurately contextualised but cursory looks at some of the abortive neighbouring plots suggest the Moscow planning office may benefit from the installation of additional glazing for the enlightenment of subsequent meetings.