19-526: Glasgow's City Halls and Old Fruitmarket is a concert hall and former market located on Candleriggs, in the Merchant City , Glasgow , Scotland . The City Halls are part of a market complex designed by John Carrick in 1882, but the grand hall itself was designed by George Murray and opened in 1841. It was the first hall suitable for large gatherings and concerts to be built in the City and played host to
38-668: A new name introduced through urban renewal by the Scottish Development Agency and the city council in the 1980s is one part of the metropolitan central area of Glasgow. It commences at George Square and goes eastwards reaching Glasgow Cross , in the centre of Glasgow , Scotland . The eastern fringe of the Merchant City contains part of Glasgow's original medieval street plan, which stretches northwards towards neighbouring Townhead . It contains offices, flats, retail shops, restaurants, and bars. Part of
57-622: A venue for many of Glasgow's Festivals, including Celtic Connections , Mayfest and the Jazz Festival , as well as political and trade union gatherings. It has been protected as a category A listed building since 1970. The City Halls and Old Fruitmarket re-opened in January 2006 after undergoing a period of extensive renovation. The refurbished halls are now the home of the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra and
76-473: Is famous for their annual festivals . Merchant city festivals have a lot of different entertainments, including street arts , dance , live music , markets, fashion and design, comedy , family events, tours , heritage walks, talks, visual art , film, and children - families activities every year. Merchant City Festival 2017 was held on 22–30 July 2017. It included two great family events as Carnival Procession and Provand’s Lordship free Family Fun Zone. Among
95-577: The Royal College of Science and Technology in the 1960s) has long had a presence in the area with several academic buildings along its northern fringe. It has owned the Ramshorn Cemetery and Church since 1983 and has used the latter as a theatre, with the most recent addition being the adjacent Technology and Innovation Centre (TIC) completed in 2014 and has regenerated much of the area between Ingram Street and George Street. Merchant
114-616: The campus of the University of Strathclyde occupies the area. The Merchant City is home to several repurposed buildings including the City Halls & Old Fruitmarket, Merchant Square, and the Scottish Youth Theatre. It hosts many annual festivals. The approximate definition of the Merchant City is the area defined by George Street to the north, High Street to the east, Trongate to the south, and Queen Street to
133-631: The GPO Building development in George Square. Another important element of the area's transformation is high-end shopping, anchored by the Italian Centre designed by Page\Park Architects who are fond of including art in their architecture. Here the art is integral to the façades, but also features in the courtyard including a sculpture, 'Thinking of Bella' (1994) by Shona Kinloch . The University of Strathclyde (which evolved from
152-506: The Glasgow Choral Union, was given in the grand hall from 1874 until the opening of the much larger St Andrew's Hall in 1877. Arthur Sullivan was its conductor for two seasons from 1875 to 1877. The Old Fruitmarket directly adjoins the grand hall and was a functioning market until the 1970s after which it was in occasional use for jazz and folk music events. The adjoining buildings were home to bustling produce markets such as
171-758: The Scottish Music Centre, both members of a partnership with the City Council and Glasgow Cultural Enterprises. The hall is also the regular performance space for the Scottish Chamber Orchestra in Glasgow and is a centre for music education with the city's Education Department as a key participant. The venue consists of several performance venues under one roof, managed by Glasgow Cultural Enterprises (which also manages The Glasgow Royal Concert Hall): The City Halls also houses
190-517: The Scottish Music Centre, offices and recording facilities for the BBC SSO, and extensive music education facilities. Arup Acoustics provided the acoustic design for the renovation, working closely with the architects Civic Design, venue consultants Arup Venue Consultancy and engineers Arup Scotland. 55°51′32″N 4°14′41″W / 55.85884°N 4.24483°W / 55.85884; -4.24483 Merchant City The Merchant City ,
209-719: The fresh fruit and flower market and the cheese market. In the past it featured concerts by the Scottish Chamber Orchestra and the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra . For a number of years, after the destruction by fire of the St Andrews Hall in 1962, it was used for concerts by the Royal Scottish National Orchestra , until the opening of Glasgow Royal Concert Hall in 1990. It has also been
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#1732780230624228-429: The highlights of the festival are carnival procession from Glasgow Cathedral , massed samba bands, a UNESCO music stage, the return of SURGE, the festival within a festival, a Street band “Encontro” and a celebration of street food. During the festival, the city hosted Hip Replacement, a family Dance-along screening of Moana and Indiana Jones, and the hugely popular live sing-a-long Massaoke. The Merchant City area
247-454: The larger New Town of Blythswood. After plans to construct the M8/M74 motorway ring road around the city centre were published in the 1960s much of the area fell into decline, with some of the buildings compulsorily purchased by the city council to allow for their demolition ahead of the new road. The central food markets moved to modern premises further east of the city centre. At the same time
266-501: The likes of Benjamin Disraeli , Charles Dickens , Hungarian patriot Lajos Kossuth and William Ewart Gladstone . From its early days it hosted a wide variety of popular and classical concerts including those by touring groups such as Louis-Antoine Jullien 's celebrated London-based orchestra and Charles Halle 's orchestra from Manchester. Glasgow's first regular orchestral subscription concert series, played by an orchestra managed by
285-568: The new Buchanan Street, rising to Blythswood Square . and beyond. As Glasgow expanded in the 19th century to become the second city of the United Kingdom and the British Empire , the old area became principally a centre of major warehouses, shipping companies, offices, distilleries and clothing manufacturers; while the markets continued in fruit, vegetables, cheese and fish. The more prosperous people moved out and set up home in
304-636: The vast number of wholesale and manufacturing warehouses declined, largely because of the national ending of Retail Price Maintenance, and the continuing movement to out of town industrial estates. However the High Street motorway road was never built and in the 1980s the decision was taken by the city council and the Scottish Development Agency to revitalise the area and its historic buildings with public and private investment in its improvements and new uses. The name 'Merchant City'
323-456: The wealthy merchant "tobacco lords" were built in the area. The district west of the congested High Street became the ancient burgh's first planned New Town, with wide, straight streets, vistas, churches and squares, marking the start of aspirational residential movements westwards. That movement would continue with new names over two centuries, including, from 1800, the creation of a second New Town, being Blythswood upon Blythswood Hill , west of
342-512: The west. The medieval Glasgow Cross continues at the junction of High Street, Trongate and Saltmarket. The town's tron , weighing scales, was placed next to the steeple of the town house in the 1550s. The Tron Steeple, as it became known, still stands at Glasgow Cross, one of the few remaining pre-Victorian buildings in Glasgow. The area now known as 'Merchant City' was developed from the 1750s onwards. It also includes St Andrew's Square , adjacent to Glasgow Green . Residences and warehouses of
361-533: Was first coined by historian and writer Charles Oakley in the 1960s, ahead of this regeneration. The Merchant City has been promoted and built up in recent years as a residential, shopping and leisure area, mirroring Covent Garden in the West End of London. To this end many new bars and restaurants have been established. This has been complemented with the building of prestigious new housing developments, often by restoring Victorian buildings. A later example being
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