Latest Statement from @GSofA on the recent Mackintosh Building Fire https://t.co/zJHDJOhJ4w
There is a fire at the Mackintosh Building. The fire brigade are currently on scene. We will report back with news… https://t.co/FMccifjUic
The Glasgow School of Art has been devastated by a huge fire, only four years after parts of the building were destroyed by a smaller blaze.
Flames spread through Glasgow School of Art in Scotland – in pictures Read more
More than 120 firefighters and 20 appliances were called to tackle the blaze, which began at about 11.15pm on Friday and spread to a neighbouring music venue, the O2 ABC.
The grade-A listed building appears to have been gutted by the fire and had its roof and upper floors destroyed. Firefighters were unable to enter the building because of fears its walls might collapse.
Residents said the heat was so intense it could be felt several streets away, with chunks of blazing timber and debris raining down on neighbouring streets. Police evacuated 27 people from nearby properties as a precaution, but there were no reported casualties.
Facebook Twitter Pinterest An aerial view of the damage caused to the Mackintosh Building in Glasgow. Photograph: Police Scotland Air/PA
Iain Bushell, a deputy chief officer with the Scottish fire and rescue service (SFRS), said the fire was now largely extinguished and under control. “There are a few hotspots and we can still see flames. It’s difficult to reach because it is such a large building and we are only firefighting from the outside because of the risk of collapse of structural elements,” he said.
“It’s a tragedy that such an important building to the people of Glasgow has been damaged again.”
Facebook Twitter Pinterest Photograph: Rocco Giudice @81Rocco
Speaking at the scene, he said the school was widely damaged. “The roof is gone completely. We cannot get in yet to assess the damage. I can only see from the street but it looks as if the building has been extensively damaged.”
Alan Dunlop, the school’s professor of architecture, said: “The building does look as though from the inside it’s been totally gutted. All that seems to remain is the stone walls.”
The damage to the building’s stonework
raises questions about whether the structure will survive this second round of intense heat.
In the last fire, the stonework endured temperatures of up to 1,000C and was then cooled down very quickly by water, leaving some of the stone cracked and and too weak to reuse.
The building was designed by the art nouveau architect and designer Charles Rennie Mackintosh, whose designs extended to the smallest detail, including its furniture, lamps and glass inlays.
Charles Rennie Mackintosh: architect of choice for Doctor Who and Madonna Read more
Its most famous feature was its library, which housed many rare and archival materials as well as original furniture and fittings, and was gutted by the first fire.
The first minister, Nicola Sturgeon, said it was a very sad morning: “It appears there are no casualties and I hope that continues to be the case ... This is clearly an extremely complex and large-scale incident, and one that is ongoing. I would like to thank the emergency services for their continued efforts.”
She said the Scottish government would provide any support required, while the secretary for Scotland, David Mundell, said the UK government was ready to help the school “financially or otherwise”.
The city celebrated the 150th anniversary of Mackintosh’s birth last week, when one of his other famous buildings, the Willow Tea Rooms nearby, reopened after a refurbishment.
Students at the school had their graduation ceremony on Friday, said Jane Sutherland, the chair of the local community council and an artist who graduated from the school in 1982.
Glasgow School Art (@GSofA) Huge congratulations to all of our graduates today! Group photographs for all schools are available on our Flickr site now: https://t.co/sn6jV19VO4 pic.twitter.com/ol2cEkpjff
She said she witnessed the fire from her flat and saw the start of the blaze in 2014. “This time around I feel numb, like ice, legs like jelly,” Sutherland said. “The fire was immense. People were dodging fist-sized flaming embers last night. All the neighbours were out; we were all worried all the roofs were going up. This area is full of architectural gems.
“It was terrifying last night. The smell of it and you could feel the heat of it two blocks away.”
She said the firefighters had been heroic. “They fought with their lives for that building; they did the last time and they have again.”
Margaret Archbold, who studied sculpture at the art school in the early nineties, said that she was relieved to see some stone left from her vantage point at the police cordon in Hill Street.
“It should have been the safest building in Glasgow,” she said. “It’s so ironic that all that money was put back in to restoring the building and celebrating the Mackintosh anniversary. It’s devastating to see when you know what’s in that building.”
Another witness, Aidan Dick, said the fire and smoke grew in intensity “in the space of a few minutes”. He tweeted: “Glasgow School of Art is on fire again. Heartbreaking. My thoughts go to all students and staff, and I hope no one was caught in the blaze.”
Bushell said: “The fire was well alight in minutes and after that it went very quickly, so the school of art is extensively damaged. It did spread to the ABC theatre on the other side of the street, so the roof is extensively damaged from that.”
The 2014 fire began when flammable gases from a foam canister used in a student project were ignited accidentally. A report by the SFRS concluded that old ventilation ducts helped it spread into neighbouring studios and upwards through the building.
Facebook Twitter Pinterest The Glasgow School of Art. Photograph: Murdo Macleod for the Guardian
The report also noted that a sprinkler system, designed to enhance existing fire protection measures, was in the latter stages of installation at the time of the fire, but was not yet operational. It is not known whether any similar system had been installed yet in the latest restoration.
Restoration work had been in constant progress since the summer of 2014, beginning with debris removal, then the salvage process conducted by specialist forensic architects, and the drying out of the building to guard against future difficulties with rot.
The restoration had been scheduled to conclude by the end of 2018, with undergraduate students returning to the building in 2019.
LONDON — A large fire ripped through the Glasgow School of Art in Scotland overnight Friday, officials said Saturday morning, causing extensive damage to a building considered the jewel in the city’s architectural crown.
It was the second time in four years that a blaze has hit the world-famous building, which was under restoration and was set to reopen after a fire badly damaged it in May 2014.
The building, widely described as a masterpiece of the Glasgow-born architect Charles Rennie Mackintosh, was completed in 1909.
Peter Heath of the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service told reporters that the call had come in at 11:19 p.m. Friday, sending more than 120 firefighters and 20 fire engines to the site.
Image copyright McAteer Photograph Image caption The full north facade of Mackintosh's Glasgow School of Art, taken before the 2014 fire
When Mackintosh's Glasgow School of Art building was first unveiled in 1899, the half-finished building was deeply unpopular but Glasgow and the world grew to appreciate its architectural genius.
These days Charles Rennie Mackintosh's most famous architectural creation has come to be widely loved and cherished.
Image caption Charles Rennie Mackintosh was lauded in Europe but struggled in Britain
And there was a national and international outpouring of grief when it was first devastated by fire in 2014 and its magnificent library completely destroyed.
Image copyright McAteer Photograph
A massive restoration project was undertaken, with the library painstakingly recreated in very detail.
It would appear all that work has been destroyed and Mackintosh's masterpiece has again been consumed by fire.
Image copyright McAteer Photograph Image caption Abstract view of front door and Directors Balcony, Mackintosh
It would have been hard to predict such affection for this building when it was first shown to the public on a rainy day in the last month of the 19th Century.
Over in the west of Glasgow, the new Kelvingrove Museum and Art Gallery, by London architects Simpson and Allen, was taking shape.
It was grand, frothy and pleasingly symmetrical.
Image copyright Glasgow School of Art Image caption First floor corridor on the east side of Mackintosh Building between Mackintosh Museum and Mackintosh Room. Completed 1897-1899
In contrast, the new Glasgow School of Art, at the back of Sauchiehall Street in the city centre, was having a more troubled birth.
The art school's maverick director, Fra Newberry, had chosen 31-year-old Mackintosh as the architect, despite him not being a partner in his firm and having only designed a couple of previous buildings.
Image copyright McAteer Photograph Image caption The railings outside Glasgow School of Art, featuring a sequence of Japanese-influenced symbols on stalks
Newberry knew Mackintosh because he was a former pupil at the art school.
Mackintosh had been a member of a group of radical students who dubbed themselves The Immortals.
Along with his friend James Herbert MacNair and the sisters Margaret and Frances Macdonald, they created innovative and, at times, controversial graphics and decorative art designs which formed the distinctive "Glasgow Style".
Image copyright McAteer Photograph Image caption A detail from the Glasgow School of Art's Mackintosh room
Newberry wanted to bring some of this style into his new art school building but the original budget only covered half of the plans and it was opened half-finished.
It was deeply unpopular, seeming to lack symmetry or logic.
Mackintosh was not invited to the opening ceremony.
Image copyright Glasgow School of Art Image caption "The Hen Run", glazed passageway running above the roof of the Mackintosh Gallery and leading to the East side of the Building. It was destroyed in 2014 but had been recreated
But slowly over the decades Glasgow and the world grew to love this strange building, with its great grid-like structure and its iron work around the windows.
Inside the building there were dark corridors and studios drenched in sunlight as well as intimate alcoves, with simple yet beautiful designs.
The building had personality.
By 1907, funds had been raised to complete the school of art building.
Image copyright Glasgow School of Art Image caption The west facade looked like a Japanese Shogun's palace with slim oriel windows
The existing east facade resembled one of Mackintosh's Barionial castles but his new west facade was very different, with a trio of slender oriel windows- more linear, geometric.
This did not look like a Scottish fortress but more like the palace of a Japanese Shogun.
Encased behind the windows was the new library.
A space in which Mackintosh's style took yet another leap forward.
Image copyright Glasgow School of Art Image caption Glasgow School of Art's library was considered one of the finest rooms in Britain before the fire that destroyed it 2014
Designed around a central courtyard like that of a Japanese residence, balconies and verandas encircled the room. There were beams that created a wooden grid floating in space.
It eventually came to be seen as the most perfect room designed by this visionary architect.
Glasgow remained unsure of Mackintosh during his lifetime and his career ground to a halt soon after the completion of the school of art.
Mackintosh, who was described as having a satanic personality and drank heavily, was thought to have had a nervous breakdown and left his architectural firm in 1910.
Image copyright McAteer Photograph Image caption The Mackintosh library before the fire
The outbreak of World War One meant he got very little work and he ended up eeking out a living as an artist in London.
He spent some of his later years in the South of France and died in 1928 at the age of 60, having not worked on an architectural project for years.
2018 is the 150th anniversary of his birth and the city that once rejected him has been celebrating his legacy and architectural genius.
There are some other buildings in the city that bear the Mackintosh mark such as Scotland Street School and Queen Cross Church but the art school was his masterpiece and it has again been destroyed.
