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Summary

Description

D Harvey and A Scott, 1955-9. 3- and 4- storey, L-plan, Modernist, former secondary school on elevated site. Concrete frame with glass and metal curtain-walls and pre-cast concrete panels; wide variety of facings including aggregate, granite, sandstone and brick; textured and patterned finishes.

Principal, 4-storey, rectangular-plan classroom block: concrete pilotis to ground; continous, horizontal glazing with insulated plastic infill panels set between storeys; textured stone facing to outer left and right. Projecting concrete grid framing upper three floors to NE (entrance elevation), jettied out on pilotis to form portico below.

3-storey, square-plan, practical classroom block to SW: glazed curtain walls with polished aggregate stone panelling to ends; angled balconies at first and second floor to SW.

Single storey assembly hall and service range within re-entrant angle: predominantly granite block with Holoblast panelled wall to NW; projecting verandas with narrow metal columns to NE; continuous clerestorey glazing. 2 cusped masonry arches to E (remnant from earlier 1870 school on same site).

Single storey administration block outshot to E: red-brick facing with granite facing to concave terminal.

Predominantly metal pivot glazing. Flat roofs. Tall, fluted concrete chimney stack centred in L-plan re-entrant angle.

INTERIOR: largely intact plan; practical and well-articulated with some reconfiguration and infill to communal spaces at ground floor level. Timber handrails to stairs set in glazed stairwells. Classrooms with back-to-back arrangement, linked by shared store-cupboard partitions; timber classroom doors with glazed view-panels. Corridors: tripartite fanlights set in walls; painted plaster with ceramic tiles; strips of coloured tiling at mid-height; coloured linoleum flooring. Replacement part-glazed timber doors to assembly hall: boarded timber panelling and parquet floor. Balustraded stairs to dining room. 1950s clocks and lighting removed following closure in 2007. Tiled areas and parquet floors deteriorating.

RETAINING WALL, BOUNDARY WALL AND GATEPIERS: coped, granite-faced, part cast-iron-railed retaining wall to front (NE); cast-iron balustraded stair from Academy Road. Low, coped sandstone wall to Academy Road. Square-plan, sandstone entrance gatepiers (1870); battlemented caps; replacement cast-iron gates.

Statement of Special Interest

The former Rothesay Academy is an important example of secondary school architecture of the 1950s in Scotland. Prominently located on high ground facing the sea with commanding views over the town, the aspirational design breaks away from the Art Deco influences of the inter-war period. It uses overtly Modernist devices such as narrow supporting columns (pilotis), sheer glazed curtain-wall classroom blocks and angular projections to emphasise its balanced, asymmetrical composition. It is one of a small number of post-war school buildings of this quality in the west of Scotland.

A substantial concrete grid fronts the classrooms above the entrance elevation. The classrooms are jettied out and supported on narrow pilotis to form a portico. The smaller, secondary block to the rear counter-balances the volume of the principal classroom block, laid on its side. The wealth of building materials used and the variation in patterned surface, colour and texture, is reminiscent of Festival of Britain (1951) architecture, and reflects the new availability of materials after post-war rationing came to an end. The architects' plans note the use of concrete blocks, cobble-faced blocks, rubbed concrete, 'Holoblast' and 'Vitroslab' panels, brick and coursed rubble sandstone and granite. The design is stylistically akin to that of Elliot School, Roehampton (1954-6) which is one of the few post-war schools currently listed in England.

Other significant schools of the 1950s include Knightswood Secondary School (see separate listing). Designed before the war but built in 1954-8, it was Gillespie, Kidd and Coia's first school in Glasgow and is a remarkable early essay in Modernism for its time. Ninian Johnston's primary school at Chirnsyde, Glasgow (1950) and Dalreoch Primary (1953-5) in Dumbarton are further, more transitional examples of the period (see separate listings).

Rothesay Academy was the first major commission by Harvey and Scott. Their successful partnership is noted for its primary and secondary school architecture, mostly in Glasgow, Central and the Lothian regions. Alexander Scott (b.1920) was 12-years Harvey's junior. David Harvey (b.1908) worked with Philip McManus in the office of T P Marwick throughout the late 30s. Of particular importance was their design for the St Cuthbert's Showroom (1937) in Bread Street, Edinburgh (see separate listing). This was the first building in Scotland to use a curtain-wall of glass for its façade, clear of the structure behind it. Harvey also assisted Marwick on various buildings for the Glasgow Empire Exhibition (overseen by Thomas Tait).

Rothesay Academy replaced a towered Gothic Revival school on the same site (the Rothesay Academy and Thomson's Institute by J R Thomson, 1870) which was demolished following an arson attack in March, 1954. A trefoil-headed arch from the earlier school is inset within the present building. When the new building opened in 1959, it was the only secondary school on Bute with a pupil roll of over 700. It took nearly 4 years to complete at a cost of £260,000. At its official opening, Lord Crichton-Stuart noted the school's "...strange quality of arrested movement, an equilibrium of....massive strength and transparent lightness...it has something of the braced economy of a ship about to be launched".

Rothesay is one of Scotland's premier seaside resorts, developed primarily during the second half of the 19th and early 20th centuries, and incorporates an earlier medieval settlement. The town retains a wide range of buildings characteristic of its development including fine villas, a Victorian pier and promenade. The history and development of Rothesay is defined by two major phases. The development of the medieval town, centred on Rothesay Castle, and the later 19th and early 20th century development of the town as a seaside resort. Buildings from this later development reflect the wealth of the town during its heyday as a tourist destination, and includes some domestic, commercial or public architecture of a scale found in larger burghs.

Listing reviewed and description updated, 2013.

References

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