St Andrews Town

We took an excursion one day to St Andrews, an hour or so from Edinburgh by train and bus, to see the “home of golf” and the Old Course.  We didn’t expect to find the town charming and fascinating as well.  I continue to be impressed with the way in which many areas in Europe manage to keep their agricultural areas healthy and yet in close proximity to their cities and towns.  This becomes particularly apparent from train travel, which whisks you from one environment in a short amount of time.  It was also July, when farmland can be particularly picturesque.

It also seems somehow that the infrastructure of a railroad can sit in the landscape in a relatively unobtrusive way.

It helps of course to have attractive platform paving, a stone bridge in the distance, and landscaping close to the right-of-way. We certainly rode many trains along tracks not nearly this well sited; but it did seem as if there is a sensibility about fitting into the landscaping that shows up frequently.

St Andrews is a former royal burgh on the east coast of Fife, named after Saint Andrew the Apostle. The town is home to the University of St Andrews, the third oldest university in the English-speaking world and the oldest in Scotland. The University is an integral part of the burgh, and during term time students make up approximately one third of the town’s population. St Andrews has a population of 16,680, making this the fifth largest settlement in Fife. As we found in much of Scotland, the town features grey granite as its primary building material, in both large and small buildings.

Some stucco and paint has been added here and there – a common approach to waterproofing for older masonry buildings.  In some places accent colors relieved the gray. I’m not sure how historical they are.

The masonry work also follows an old tradition of using ‘dressed’ stone around doors and windows and at critical corners combined with more random pieces in the ‘field’ of the wall. In some places landscaping softens the overall effect.

Were we to live in Scotland this would be a requirement. As handsome as the stone can be, the amount of gray in the built environment combined with the gray climate and short winter days must be overwhelming – speaking of which:

Here’s a pile of civic presence – a courthouse I believe. To the east of town a large ruin of the abbey of St Andrew dominates a high point on a cliff above the sea.

There has been an important church in St Andrews since at least the 8th century, and a bishopric since at least the 11th century. The settlement grew to the west of St Andrews cathedral with the southern side of the Scores to the north and the Kinness burn to the south. The burgh soon became the ecclesiastical capital of Scotland, a position which was held until the Scottish Reformation. The famous cathedral, the largest in Scotland, now lies in ruins.

Given the small size of the burgh, the cathedral must truly have dominated the setting. Now, though, it’s mostly a collection of walls, towers and grave-sites – which of course have their own architectural appeal.

Walking back into town by a different route took us by St Andrew’s University and here a typical quadrangle.

 

The University of St Andrews is a public research university. It is the oldest of the four ancient universities of Scotland, and the third oldest in the English-speaking world (following Oxford and Cambridge). It was founded between 1410 and 1413 when the Avignon Anti-pope Benedict XIII issued a Papal Bull to a small founding group of Augustinian clergy. Some of the more recent buildings have a quiet, contemporary presence – but not a whole lot of charm.

 

We liked the look of some nearby housing better

As well as the view from the nearby cliffs

 

The Scottish Parliament

A poetic union between the Scottish landscape, its people, its culture, and the city of Edinburgh

The Acts of Union 1707 merged the Kingdom of Scotland with the Kingdom of England (to form the Kingdom of Great Britain. Previously, Scotland had an independent parliament known as the Three Estates. Initial Scottish proposals in the negotiation over the Union suggested a devolved Parliament be retained in Scotland, but this was not accepted by the English negotiators. A sharp rise in nationalism in Scotland during the late 1960’s fueled demands for some form of home rule or complete independence. Devolution continued to be part of the platform of the Labor Party which, in May 1997, took power underTony Blair. In September 1997, the 1997 Scottish devolution referendum was put to the Scottish electorate and secured a majority in favor of a new devolved Scottish Parliament in Edinburgh. In 1991 power was transferred from Westminster to the new Parliament.

The Parliament building sits at the east end of the Royal Mile, adjacent to Holyrood Palace. This location brings it in close visual contact with Arthur’s Seat, a dormant volcanic cone now a city park, seen beyond the front entrance.

Since September 2004, the official home of the Scottish Parliament has been a new Scottish Parliament Building, in the Holyrood area of Edinburgh. Designed by Spanish architect Enric Miralles. Some of the principal features of the complex include leaf-shaped buildings, a grass-roofed branch merging into adjacent parkland and gabion walls formed from the stones of previous buildings. Queen Elizabeth IIopened the new building in 2004. From the outset, the building and its construction have been controversial. The choices of location, architect, design, and construction company were all criticized by politicians, the media and the Scottish public. It opened in 2004, more than three years late with an estimated final cost of £414 million, many times higher than initial estimates. The building placed fourth in a 2008 poll on what UK buildings people would most like to see demolished; but it was welcomed by architectural academics and critics. The building aimed to achieve a poetic union between the Scottish landscape, its people, its culture, and the city of Edinburgh. The building challenges you, even if you’re an architect, with a series of discontinuous and awkward juxtapositions of forms.  Here’s an overview in model form.

While there may (or may not) be carefully articulated forms related to the landscape, the urban relationships tend more towards  confrontation.

In fact, it’s hard to figure out exactly what’s going on with the facade.  I’m sure the people who live in the apartments across the way must wonder as well.

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I didn’t have the opportunity, unfortunately, to experience the offices from the inside; but from outside it appears that each one has its own little stairway and a variety of windows, some shielded and some not.  It’s hard to conceive of either programmatic or environmental concerns that would drive these forms.  Similar gestures occur inside.  The entry concourse provides a quiet beginning.

The circulation from the lobby to a stair to the assembly hall moves more assertively.

The view of the daylight courtyard coveys a medieval fortress quality.

There are a lot of ideas suggested by the building that seem to reference the work of Alvar Aalto, especially his city hall complex for the town of Saynatsalo; but this is not Aalto’s grace and continuity.

And yet, when you finally make it to the balcony level of the assembly hall, the overall effect is quite wonderful.

The space really generates a focus on the debate below; and the strong introduction of wood with metal detailing warms and humanizes the space.  I was struck by the way the trusses also draw inspiration from Aalto’s work; but expand on it in both scale and complexity.

The lighting and speakers, treated much like theater equipment, animate the whole ceiling composition and keep the structure from feeling overly dominant.  As a final grace note, the furnishings were all custom designed to go with the space.  They work to both provide close up visual interest and provide a good level of comfort.

Overall conclusion ?  Definitely worth the tour.  Many spaces a struggle but the climax makes the effort worth it.  Less successful on the exterior and it accommodating its neighbors.

Edinburgh Castle

Mounted dramatically on the appropriately named Castle Rock, Edinburgh Castle has dominated the city skyline for over 1,000 years. I’m using this Wikipedia photo to illustrate the setting because, as you will see, the weather was considerably thicker the day we were there.

The castle included a royal residence until the 1600’s when England and Scotland were united, after which it continued as a predominantly military barracks.  Many of the buildings were destroyed in one or another siege; but St Margaret’s Chapel, the Royal Palace and the Great Hall survive – though with somewhat updated interiors.  The castle is Scotland’s most visited paid tourist site, much of this traffic coming from attendance at the Edinburgh Military Tattoo, part of the Edinburgh International Festival.  As with many fortified sites, the approach to the castle occurs in stages, of which the first one seems peculiar.

 

 

This is the arena where the military tattoo is held. Its design interjects a football stadium ambiance into the otherwise historic setting. It’s a bit of a jarring juxtaposition which made me wonder if some more historic references could have been included or at least the seating could have been some other color than baby blue.

Hard to keep your mind in the 16th century with this as an entry sequence.

Another gate takes you out of the stadium environment and into the castle proper

And then, after you buy your ticket, yet another gate controls your progress into the more secure center.

This definitely feels more like a fortified passage able to be defended.  On the map below, this gate sits on the right hand side near the notation for ‘audio guides’.  You can see that the plan spirals ever more tightly in to the most secure castle location.

One of the cannons used to defend the castle has been re-purposed as a giant time piece, being fired once a day.

Obviously on this particular day you wouldn’t be aiming at anything in particular.  I’m not sure whether weather like this, common here, made it easier to attack or easier to defend the castle.  I liked the detailing of some of the buildings a lot – the use of darker, more regular stone to outline the forms of the roofs.  I also liked the freedom with which essentially symmetrical elevations have been skewed and shifted.  It makes you pay attention.

Here’s a detail, though, where the symmetrical form has been emphasized with the accents being in the way the light and dark stones are mixed in the facades.

St Margaret’s Chapel compressed its functions into a minimal space; but the details shone:

The great hall’s presence comes across clearly, though its appearance has been updated over the centuries.

Over all the site and its buildings gave a very clear impression of what the place has been – a very important but also very compressed series of activities occurring in their own world. For a more historically detailed description see this blog post from a Bit About Britain.