An Ideas Competition for the adaptive reuse of Thomson’s Egyptian Halls
In 2019, The Alexander Thomson Society invited designers from around the world to develop ideas for the adaptive re-use of Alexander ‘Greek’ Thomson’s Egyptian Halls, one of Glasgow’s greatest historic buildings.
The objective of the completion was to invite innovative, imaginative and purposeful design solutions for the reuse of the A-listed Egyptian Halls, a warehouse building completed in 1872 on Union Street, Glasgow by the celebrated, nineteenth-century architect Alexander Thomson (1817-1875).
The purpose of this competition and exhibition was not to form a feasibility study or develop an architectural approach, but to raise awareness of an important part of Glasgow’s architectural heritage which unfortunately is in a poor condition and at significant risk of further decay and possible demolition.
The Society invited entrants to generate concepts for alternative uses for the Egyptian Halls and wanted to provide little limits to entrants creativity. The only conditions applied were:
– The Union Street facade and the rear facade to the lane must be retained and restoration assumed;
– The internal cast iron structure may be retained or adjusted as a matter of judgement;
– Roof top additions are to respect the appearance of the building from the street.
The Submissions were reviewed on the basis of quality, strength of concept, intergration with the original building fabric and the response to the wider urban context of the site.
We received 21 entries to the competition, both from the UK and from farther afield, including the USA, India, Brazil, Russia, the Phillipines, Slovenia and China.
All entries are published below. We also plan to launch a public vote for the entries, allowing members of the public and our membership to vote for the entires which they think are best, or to offer alternative suggestions.
Winners:
1st Prize / Commendations
We are planning to hold a public vote on all entries as part of our Save Egyptian Halls campaign to have the building listed as one of Europa Nostra’s 7 Most Endangered heritage sites. We want this vote to be (as much as possible) uninfluenced by the formal judging process which has already been undertaken.
Following the public vote, we will update this page to display the winning entries. In the meantime, the winning entries are announced here.
All Entries:
1: Akshay Narwekar, Nikita Nadkarni & Sindhu Sivakami
(Mumbai, India)
Urban Synthesis – A Transit Cultural Hub
2: Charles Palmer
(Manchester, UK)
Egyptian Meeting Rooms – Meeting the Fourth Dimension
3: Chiara Barrett, Declan Corbett & Matthew Lyall
(London, UK)
The Egyptian Halls as a Public Interior – A Series of Rooms for Glasgow
4: Clive Edwards & Jim McNett
(London, UK)
Egyptian Halls Reimagined
5: Edson Mahfuz, Ana Paula Alcantara Gomes & Eduarda Pydd
(Porto Alegre, Brazil)
Cultural / Arts / Research Institution
6: Elvis Jerkič
(Tolmin, Slovenia)
Facade as Public Space
7: Estefanía Macchi
(Inverness, UK)
Let’s Meet in Glasgow – An Indoor Agora
8: Eunice Valerie, Lim Naida, Felicia Cruz Guillen & Ann Castillo
(Quezon City, Phillipines)
Opening Paths
9: Francisco Ruela, George Gizas, Ying Liu & Manuel Millan
(New York, USA)
The Egyptian Halls Urban Mobility Centre
10: Gavin Fraser
(Polmont, UK)
Museum of Slavery
11: Igor Shkut & Vasilii Portnyagin
(Saint-Petersburg, Russia)
Temple of Thought
12: Jia HU
(Shanghai, China)
Future Proposal
13: John Joseph Burns
(Glasgow, UK)
The Egyptian Halls School of Architecture
14: Kirsty Gaunt
(Stroud, UK)
Egyptian Halls Wellbeing Centre
15: Little Black Box Collective in collaboration with Brendan Higgins
(Glasgow, UK)
The Union Bield
16: Lucy Dyke, Javier Garcia-Valenzuela, Marte Dalelv, Ross Blair & Alistair Chikwawawa
(Edinburgh, UK)
Reimagining Egyptian Halls
17: Maria Luiza Dutra, Leticia Baldo, Daniel Carcavalli & Diego Pinheiro
(São Paulo, Brazil)
Reimagining Egyptian Halls
18: Nicholas Roberts
(Glasgow, UK)
The Consumption Rooms
19: Richard Griffiths
(London, UK)
Resetting the Work-Life Balance
20: Shubhashri Deependu Upasani & Shreyas Nandkumar Amraskar
(Pune, India)
Experiencing the Grecian World – A Multi-Dimensional Gallery
21: Tom Stark & James Faulds
(Glasgow, UK)
A New School for Central Glasgow