Glasgow School of Art building history, GSA The Mac architecture, Charles Rennie Mackintosh Scotland

History Of the Glasgow School of Art Building

18 April 2024

Life is full of art from the scenes you see outside daily to paintings and sculptures you can witness at a museum. If you love art and want to extend your collegiate education in learning your favorite art form, look no further than the Glasgow School of Art, which is the 13th for the QS WUR Ranking By Subject 2024. Plus, the prestigious school was designated in 2022 as 11th place within the QS World Rankings for Art and Design.

Let’s dive into the history of the Glasgow School of Art building. Who was the architect? Did the school go through any name changes? What other special historical events took place that potential attendees should know about before enrolling? Let’s get into it!

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Glasgow School of Art building history
photo © Jörg Bittner Unna, CC BY 3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Who Was the Architect Of the Glasgow School of Art Building?

Charles Rennie Mackintosh was the Scottish architect behind the Glasgow School of Art building, erecting the structure with an Art Nouveau Architecture style. Funny enough, the architect was born in the Townsend portion of Glasgow within the United Kingdom. The art school was also built in Glasgow, United Kingdom.

While the school itself was established in 1845, the building for it that now teaches modern-day art students had not begun construction until 1896. Half of the new school building was finished by 1899. The construction project was fully finished in 1909 once the second half of the building was complete.

Name Changes and Academic Schools

The school went by a different name, which was the Glasgow Government School of Design when it was first discovered in 1845. By 1853, school officials and the board decided to change the school’s name to the Glasgow School of Art.

There are four academic schools in which students can study from when they attend the Glasgow School of Art which are the School of Fine Art, the School of Innovation and Technology, the School of Design, and the Mackintosh School of Architecture (of course, inspired by the school’s architect).

Two Raging Fires In Four Years

Unfortunately, the special Mackintosh architectural creation that is the Glasgow School of Art was stricken by two fires in 4 years. The first flare up occurred on May 23, 2014 around 12:30 p.m. local time. Some final year students were getting ready to show off their final artwork in a degree show that was scheduled for that day. Despite the mishap, about 70% of what was inside the building was salvageable while only 10% of the building itself was no longer safe to dwell. Hence, the fire thankfully did not cause that much damage.

The second Glasgow School of Art fire took place on June 15, 2018 around 11:20 p.m.. The damage that this second fire caused was greater than the prior one four years earlier. The local O2 ABC music area and the on-campus nightclub was highly damaged along with a good portion of the school building. The Mackintosh library was undergoing renovations at the time with plans for a grand reopening in 2019, but some of the renovations had to be redone because of the fire. Repairing the building after the fire was so hectic that surrounding business owners, home owners, and apartment living residents could barely get into their businesses or homes.

Learn More About the Glasgow School of Art

The Glasgow School of Art is one of the greatest university institutions throughout Europe specializing in teaching and reinforcing various visually artistic studies. Art students from all over the world enroll at this institution mainly because of another campus located in Forres and even a representative office is based in China to bring more international students to study in Europe.

In fact, amongst 95 countries worldwide, there are already 20,000 graduates of the Glasgow School of Art and counting. Become a part of this prestigious university and enroll today!

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