Renewing Sauchiehall Street
From January – June 2025, over 1,600 people shared their stories, ideas, and hopes for Sauchiehall Street. This informed our Proof of Concept application to the National Lottery Heritage Fund. Over the next two years, we’ll deliver your vision.
What you Inspired:
Heritage Protection
• Restoring the Charles Cameron Memorial Fountain
• Undertaking a phased development of the McLellan Galleries a shared creative space
Affordable Housing
• Identifying buildings for feasibility studies
Building Improvements
• Piloting a street-wide maintenance programme
• Creating a design code to guide future development
The McLellan Galleries
Named after its founder, Archibald McLellan, (1795–1854), a wealthy city coach builder, councillor and patron of the arts, the Galleries, built in 1855-6 to a design by James Smith, cost £40,000. Following McLellan’s death, the Galleries were bought by Glasgow Corporation. Before Mackintosh completed his landmark building on Renfrew Street, the Galleries housed Glasgow School of Art.
The frontage on Sauchiehall Street is now home to McLellan Works. From 1904 – 1986 it was known as Trerons, a huge department store bringing Parisian chic to the street. A major fire at the store in 1986 damaged the Galleries behind and a renovation project was undertaken. In 1990 the Galleries reopened as the largest climate controlled, temporary exhibition space in Scotland.
Glasgow School of Art returned to the building after the first fire in 2014 reaffirming the Galleries role as a cultural cornerstone.
Now, this project seeks to re-establish the building as a creative hub in the heart of the District working with three cultural partners: Glasgow Film Theatre, Scottish Ensemble and Articulate Cultural Trust.
The Wonky Fountain (Cameron Memorial Fountain)
At the corner of Sauchiehall Street and Woodside Crescent stands a striking terracotta monument with a tilt, and a tale.
Built in honour of Sir Charles Cameron (1841–1925), a newspaper editor, Liberal politician, and leading voice in the Temperance Movement, this fountain once quenched the city’s thirst and marked the hour with glowing clock faces.
Designed in exuberant Baroque style, it features:
- A polished granite base and ornate terracotta structure
- Bronze portrait medallions of Cameron by sculptor George Tinworth
- Clock faces on both sides (originally backlit)
- A cast iron waterspout (now removed) that once made it a true drinking fountain
Locally it’s affectionately called the Wonky Fountain, thanks to its famous lean, first spotted in 1926. For decades, it served as a meeting point outside the Grand Hotel, until the hotel was demolished to make way for the M8 motorway in 1969.
Created by architect Robert Bryden of Clarke & Bell and crafted by Mr. Lightbody of Doulton & Co., this Category B listed landmark is more than just a fountain - it’s a piece of Glasgow’s living history.
In the next phase of our project, we plan to repair the fountain back to it's former glory and create a small pocket park around it. Community-led research will inform heritage interpretation for the site, reflecting the area's history.
Greening Sauchiehall Street
Did you know that the slopes of Garnethill used to be strawberry fields or that the name Sauchiehall comes from old Scots for a Willow Valley or Meadow?
During conversations with the public, we discovered that greening Sauchiehall Street is important to people in Glasgow. One of our plans in the next phase of the project is to commission a new bespoke nature-based art commissions on the Street, which bring together greenery and heritage interpretation.