Glasgow (Scotland) City Council have appointed a team led by Dutch firm MVRDV and British firm Austin-Smith: Lord, supported by Space Syntax and a multidisciplinary team, to embark on the design of District Regeneration Frameworks for four districts of Glasgow City Centre.
These Regeneration Frameworks will look to create a clear urban structure to realise Glasgow’s economic, cultural and social potential.
Their appointment follows the success of the city’s first regeneration framework which improved Sauchiehall Street and Garnethill.
Today Glasgow’s city centre is a wonderful historical ensemble but it faces – as with many post-industrial cities – challenges including some vacant buildings, under-utilised plots, changes in retail patterns, city centre living, public open space, safety and traffic.
The areas now being targeted under the council’s city centre strategy are Central, St Enoch, Broomielaw and Blythswood.
Winy Maas of MVRDV said: “We have an incredibly exciting opportunity to further elaborate Glasgow centre’s potential on every scale. For the residents it is to make the city a vibrant and exciting place to live in at this moment. But we have to look ahead as well and create the plan for a city that can adapt and change in response to whatever the future throws at it; while at the same time capturing and developing the identity of the city and its people and further stimulating programmatic and economic development.”
MVRDV was founded in 1993 by Winy Maas, Jacob van Rijs, and Nathalie de Vries in Rotterdam, the Netherlands. The practice engages globally in providing solutions to contemporary architectural and urban issues. A highly collaborative, research-based design method involves clients, stakeholders and experts from a wide range of fields from early on in the creative process.
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