Made in Glasgow

摘要

Young Glasgow practice McGinlay Bell is living proof of the benefits of staying close to home. Its directors, Brian McGinlay and Mark Bell, hail from Glasgow and Kilmarnock, were made in Glasgow and, for the most part, their frames of reference proudly revolve around this city. Speaking on video call, they initially come across as an odd couple. McGinlay, slickly coiffed in a crisp deep navy shirt buttoned to the collar, seems the model of the driven, aspiring designer; whereas the more grizzled Bell, shy at first and wearing a blue flannel shirt and beanie, appears more like a Firth fisherman. After a while the shirt's conceit of a Vivienne Westwood logo will be revealed; and as for the reticence, like the eponymous lozenge, it's not long before he warms up too. Setting up on their own in 2016, the two might have carved a niche for themselves in local domestic extensions and one-off houses, but the sense is that they have their eyes on bigger prizes - an ambition thwarted over the pandemic year though they both retain a Celtic optimism in adversity. The practice has just completed their latest home, Bearsden House, on Glasgow's northern fringes, a sizeable and stealth-like private home of full glazing, black-stained timber and dark brick, displaying a clear ability to successfully manipulate materials - especially here in a conservation area. But it's the plan they feel proudest of. 'It had a narrow frontage and a very long plan on a landscaped site, and it was important that the spaces connected back to nature in a particular way,' explains Bell. 'We cut courtyards all through the plan so every part of the building was connected to a garden space; pushing the idea of filtering the home through the landscape... in the end we could have built it from anything.'