Co-operative Building / Gusset Building:
The building known as the Gusset Building due to the wedge shaped site it occupies comprised of three discernible parts, with the west part being the most ornate. A huge fire on 28th November 2011 gutted much of the building. Of the three buildings, two were completely gutted from ground floor to roofline with all the floors and roof burnt out and collapsed within. The third building to the west with the clock on the top of its west elevation and the most ornate of the three survived in a better condition.
The buildings had lain empty since the Co-operative funeral service vacated the site. Originally designed by the Donald Bruce and Edward Alexander Buckingham Hay architectural partnership with a building date of 1876, the building was one of the numerous warehouses the Bruce & Hay partnership designed and was commissioned by the Scottish Co-operative Wholesale Societies (SCWS). The building to the front of the warehouse was French renaissance in style with carved details at the doors, and on the north elevation a large pedimented doorway with fine ashlar detailing and carving was sited halfway down the elevation. The building was Category B listed.

All three buildings making up the wedge shaped site were declared by building control as 'dangerous' and demolition of all three was confirmed as of a couple of weeks after the fire. These photographs were taken in the brief gap between the fire and the beginning of the demolition. The demolition up to December 23rd had included the rear of the building, leaving only the front ornate building with the clock standing. Whilst permission had been granted for the demoltion of this last remaining part actual demolition is dependent on a decision to be made post-structural surveys to be carried out in January 2012, the survival of the B listed front part therefore currently hangs in the balance.

street address: 120 Morrison Street, Glasgow, G5 8LH
Latitude / Longitude: 55.853946,-4.268391 (sourced using Google Maps)
site visit date: 15 December 2011

south-west corner and looking eastwards down Morrison Street (15/12/2011)


south-west top corner with the paint peeled from the blond sandstone (15/12/2011)


south elevation with the three discernible parts of the building clearly visible as marked by the top line of the blue painted ground floor frontage (15/12/2011)


west frontage and view down Morrison Street (15/12/2011)


the west elevation with its rectilinear French renaissance influenced design and the large clock at the top (15/12/2011)


main door on the west elevation with corninthian capitals atop the columns flanking the doorway (15/12/2011)


forever midday the clock sits atop the 1876 building date (15/12/2011)


north elevation onto Paisley Road (15/12/2011)


west end of the north elevation (15/12/2011)


fire ravaged stonework at the top floor of the north elevation (15/12/2011)


the intense heat of the fire has cracked and caused massive damage to the stonework (15/12/2011)


former Funeral Service signage at ground floor level on the north elevation (15/12/2011)


view west down Paisley Road with the other former and much grander Co-op building in the background (converted to flats) (15/12/2011)


the ornate and finely carved ashlar doorway and centrepiece to the north elevation (15/12/2011)


Original stone carving over doorway (15/12/2011)


pediment details (15/12/2011)


acanthus sited atop the pediment (15/12/2011)


the east end of the north elevation, the collapsed floors and missing roof has left the building mostly destroyed with views straight through the windows skyward showing the missing roof (15/12/2011)


a mass of collapsed charred timbers is clearly visible through one of the north elevation doorways (15/12/2011)


north-east corner of the building with its cure and doorway at ground floor level (15/12/2011)


east elevation showing the plainness of the building here in comparison to the opposte west end portion (15/12/2011)


Co-operative Funeral signage on the adjacent building (15/12/2011)


east elevation onto Laidlaw Street and the view looking westwards down Morrison Street with the Kingston Bridge visible in the distance (15/12/2011)


point of entry for firefighters on the east end of the south elevation (15/12/2011)


charred collapsed timbers visible through the window opening (15/12/2011)


floors one and two of the south elevation and charred stone walls inside and out (15/12/2011)


roof line on the south elevation (15/12/2011)




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