Ruchill Church Hall

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The halls stand next to the church tower. In the background a factory stands on the other side of the canal.
Street facade
To the south of the halls a tenement stands at the junction to Maryhill Road

Ruchill Church Hall, designed by Charles Rennie Mackintosh, was built as a mission for the Free Church of Scotland and completed in 1899. It is located at 15/17 Shakespeare Street, a side road off Maryhill Road, Glasgow, Scotland, close to the bridge which takes Ruchill Street across the Forth and Clyde Canal to the Ruchill area, and near a shopping centre on the main road. The adjacent church closer to the canal was constructed later, designed by a different architect.

The building provides two halls, with the main hall having a section divided off by a sliding folding partition, and two committee rooms. It is in active use by the congregation of the church, and is open daily providing community facilities as well as a "Mackintosh Tea Room" providing teas and snacks in the main hall for anyone wanting to visit.

Entering from Shakespeare Street, a committee room is to the right, while to the left a passageway leads past a screened washbasin to a door to the stairwell. Next on the left is a small kitchen / servery, while straight ahead from the main entrance doors lead into the corner of the main hall. On the right a large bay is separated off from the main main hall with a sliding folding partition incorporating high level glazed panels with Mackintosh's characteristic stained glass inserts.

The stair leads up to a short corridor past toilet facilities located above the kitchen, leading to an upper committee room directly above the committee room downstairs, and to an upper hall above the bay off the main hall. These two rooms are separated by a sliding folding partition which can be opened to form one long rectangular space. The roof structure to the upper committee room and hall is exposed, with roof lights to both rooms, and its gable forms a strong shape to the right of the front elevation.

The hall is notable for the unusual distinction of having a clear representation of a human face in its main elevation, although it is unclear whether this was deliberate on the part of the architect.

Tea Room in the main hall

Additional pictures

  • View of the church from the canal

  • The halls from Shakespeare Street

  • The halls from Ruchill Street

  • Passageway between hall and church

  • Close up of the stair tower

  • Close up at main entrance

  • Tea room in main hall

  • Roof truss inside hall

  • Roof truss at entrance end of hall

  • Folding partition to bay off hall

  • Committee room door, kitchen sliding door

  • Committee room

  • Committee room door detail

  • screen (modern?) in passageway to stair

  • Stairwell

  • Upper committee room

  • Upper committee room - partition to hall

  • Upper hall

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Charles Rennie Mackintosh.

Coordinates: 55°53′12″N 4°17′01″W / 55.88673°N 4.28372°W / 55.88673; -4.28372

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