HOTEL REVIEW


Graven Images look to Blythswood Square’s chequered past to find an unlikely source of inspiration for the Town House Collection’s £25m redevelopment of a local landmark.


Blythswood Square Glasgow


Words: Catherine Martin Photography: Renzo Mazzolini A


former red light district may seem a dubious place to open a luxury hotel. And basing the interiors on its unsavoury past even more


questionable. But this is exactly what hotelier Peter Taylor has done with the latest addition to The Town House Collection. Converted from a row of Georgian


townhouses overlooking one of Glasgow’s only remaining green spaces, Blythswood Square is an 100-bed boutique hotel with a story to tell. Not wanting to shy away from its past, each of the sixty or so sash windows across the façade features a blood-red lampshade. During the hours of daylight they look decidedly innocent, but as night falls the lights come alive indicating the goings on of a bygone era. References to the area’s history continue inside where design work was carried out by locally- based practice Graven Images. Having first made their name designing bars and nightclubs, Graven Images has gone on


to win a steady stream of hotel contracts over the past eight or nine years, from the boutique Tigerlily in Edinburgh (also owned by Taylor), to the impending Hotel Missoni in Kuwait. For their latest project, Design Director Jim Hamilton was keen to retain the heritage of the hotel, incorporating aspects into its design rather than having to rely on Scottish clichés. A meeting at Blythswood’s bar reveals


that this is a project Hamilton is particularly passionate about. He relishes in the narrative of Graven Image’s design for Blythswood, claiming there are too many middle-of-the- road hotels that have “zero experience”, something this property can’t be accused of. The hotel itself is perhaps better known for its links with the Royal Scottish Automobile Association (RSAC). In the early 1900s, the club bought up single houses along the eastern side of Blythswood Square until it owned the whole row, commissioning James Miller to remodel them as its headquarters. The


090 SEPTEMBER / OCTOBER 2010 WWW.SLEEPERMAGAZINE.COM


existing architecture has somewhat dictated the new floorplan with the hotel’s public spaces remaining in the main building. Original features including marble flooring, cornice work, pillars and staircases have been retained. Other details have been reproduced in a more modern style. Taylor – who worked closely with the design team – was keen to keep the original parquet flooring, for example, but its sorry state meant it had to be replaced. Hamilton enlisted Surface Plus to develop a new product in a large-scale herringbone pattern respectful of the age and style of the building. The canvas throughout is largely antique white with colour and detail added through fixtures, fittings and finishes. Hamilton is particularly proud of is the bespoke design of almost every piece of furniture in the hotel, produced by local manufacturers where possible. “...The chairs, the armchairs, the sofas, the headboards, the bed bases, the bar stools, the tables, pretty much everything,”


Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16  |  Page 17  |  Page 18  |  Page 19  |  Page 20  |  Page 21  |  Page 22  |  Page 23  |  Page 24  |  Page 25  |  Page 26  |  Page 27  |  Page 28  |  Page 29  |  Page 30  |  Page 31  |  Page 32  |  Page 33  |  Page 34  |  Page 35  |  Page 36  |  Page 37  |  Page 38  |  Page 39  |  Page 40  |  Page 41  |  Page 42  |  Page 43  |  Page 44  |  Page 45  |  Page 46  |  Page 47  |  Page 48  |  Page 49  |  Page 50  |  Page 51  |  Page 52  |  Page 53  |  Page 54  |  Page 55  |  Page 56  |  Page 57  |  Page 58  |  Page 59  |  Page 60  |  Page 61  |  Page 62  |  Page 63  |  Page 64  |  Page 65  |  Page 66  |  Page 67  |  Page 68  |  Page 69  |  Page 70  |  Page 71  |  Page 72  |  Page 73  |  Page 74  |  Page 75  |  Page 76  |  Page 77  |  Page 78  |  Page 79  |  Page 80  |  Page 81  |  Page 82  |  Page 83  |  Page 84  |  Page 85  |  Page 86  |  Page 87  |  Page 88  |  Page 89  |  Page 90  |  Page 91  |  Page 92  |  Page 93  |  Page 94  |  Page 95  |  Page 96  |  Page 97  |  Page 98  |  Page 99  |  Page 100  |  Page 101  |  Page 102  |  Page 103  |  Page 104  |  Page 105  |  Page 106  |  Page 107  |  Page 108  |  Page 109  |  Page 110  |  Page 111  |  Page 112  |  Page 113  |  Page 114  |  Page 115  |  Page 116  |  Page 117  |  Page 118  |  Page 119  |  Page 120  |  Page 121  |  Page 122  |  Page 123  |  Page 124  |  Page 125  |  Page 126  |  Page 127  |  Page 128  |  Page 129  |  Page 130  |  Page 131  |  Page 132  |  Page 133  |  Page 134  |  Page 135  |  Page 136  |  Page 137  |  Page 138  |  Page 139  |  Page 140  |  Page 141  |  Page 142  |  Page 143  |  Page 144  |  Page 145  |  Page 146  |  Page 147  |  Page 148  |  Page 149  |  Page 150  |  Page 151  |  Page 152  |  Page 153  |  Page 154  |  Page 155  |  Page 156  |  Page 157  |  Page 158  |  Page 159  |  Page 160  |  Page 161  |  Page 162  |  Page 163  |  Page 164  |  Page 165  |  Page 166  |  Page 167  |  Page 168  |  Page 169  |  Page 170  |  Page 171  |  Page 172  |  Page 173  |  Page 174  |  Page 175  |  Page 176  |  Page 177  |  Page 178  |  Page 179  |  Page 180  |  Page 181  |  Page 182  |  Page 183  |  Page 184  |  Page 185  |  Page 186  |  Page 187  |  Page 188