Six of the best of Glasgow’s hidden gems

by Tracey Macintosh

Glasgow is a vibrant, multi-cultural city with an impressive range of museums and art galleries. Each has a story to tell of how this small rural settlement on the River Clyde grew to become an industrial powerhouse for the world as well as Europe’s City of Culture in 1990, City of Architecture and Design in 1999 and the site of the 2014 Commonwealth Games.

As Scotland’s largest metropolis, with a population of just under 1.7 million inhabitants, Glasgow offers a great choice of restaurants, bars, shopping and must-see tourist spots. However, some of its less well-known gems are worth exploring but often overlooked.

Despite it’s industrial heritage and reputation Glasgow ranks as one of the top 10 cities in the UK for urban green spaces, many of which have some intriguing history.

Botanic Gardens

Originally established in 1817, at the Western end of Sauchiehall Street, the gardens flourished and were moved to the current site, just off Great Western Road between 1839 and 1842 in order to accommodate the rapidly expanding collections.

The centre piece of the gardens is Kibble Palace, a jewel in the crown of the city. This impressive collection of glass houses, with a large domed centre piece measuring 150 feet in diameter, nurtures a collection of tree ferns, rare orchids and an eclectic mix of plants from Africa, the Americas, the Far East, New Zealand and Australia.

Kibble Palace, Glasgow Botanic Gardens

Photo by Kenny Lam/VisitScotland

Parts of Kibble Palace are akin to a tropical jungle and the juxtaposition of environments provides a natural feast for the senses.

Situated just off one of the busiest roads in the city the Botanic Gardens provide a pleasant surprise for visitors who stray through the gates into a living homage to explorers and collectors of the 19th century who brought back many of the unusual specimens still thriving today.

A recent addition to the gardens is a tearoom in the former curator’s house, close to Kibble Palace, which provides visitors with welcome refreshment following their wanderings around the lavish grounds.

In addition to the more exotic plant collections on view inside the glass house there is a great mix of meandering tree lined walks with views to the River Kelvin outside.

Pollok Country Park

On the south side of the city another of Glasgow’s beautiful green spaces is Pollok Country Park.

Once a sprawling country estate it now offers wonderful walks through a mix of woodland and formal gardens. It is also home to the Burrell Collection, an eclectic multitude of valuable artefacts acquired by shipping magnate Sir William Burrell over many years and donated to the city.

The museum design acknowledges its rural setting with huge windows looking on to parts of the estate and cleverly accommodates architectural aspects of the collection within its own walls and doorways.

Pollok House, Pollok Country Park

Photo by Kenny Lam/VisitScotland

Paintings, stained glass, sculptures, tapestry and various other objects of art spanning five centuries are all beautifully displayed within a modern but sensitive setting.

The park is also the location for Pollok House, the former ancestral home of the Stirling Maxwell family who owned the lands for over 700 years. Gifted to the city in 1966 it is now houses an impressive art collection, featuring paintings by the likes of El Greco, Goya, Rubens and Blake as well as a range of antiques.

Built in 1752 Pollok House became the family’s main residence, although there were no less than three castles built within what is now known as Pollok Country Park. The most recent was built around 1500 and destroyed in a fire in 1882. The Old Stable Courtyard was built on the site of this castle.

Open to visitors and now in the care of the National Trust for Scotland, Pollock House is a great example of Georgian architecture and showcases the grandeur of genteel country living in the 18th and 19th centuries.

The Glasgow Necropolis

On the more macabre side, Glasgow’s Victorian cemetery established in 1832 houses some incredible tombs, some of which were designed by Alexander ‘Greek’ Thomson and Charles Rennie Mackintosh.

Situated to the east of Glasgow Cathedral, and with over 50,000 burials, the Necropolis is on a raised area overlooking the city.

Predating the Necroplis, the first statue of John Knox, erected in Scotland in 1825, can be found surveying the cemetery from its uppermost point. Although Knox is buried in Edinburgh, close to St Giles Cathedral, his grave was paved over and now lies beneath a parking area.

© MSeses / Wikimedia Commons / CC BY-SA 4.0

An interdenominational burial site from its conception the Necropolis is thought to have been inspired by Pere LaChaise in Paris with its landscaped, decorative parkland. The views to Glasgow Cathedral and over the city are pretty impressive.

Charles Rennie Mackintosh and Charles Tennant are among the well known figures now at rest in Glasgow’s city of the dead but one of the most poignant memorials is that to still born children. It is located just inside the gates and before the Bridge of Sighs.

Guided walking tours are available. Despite the sombre setting, the landscape led design and the variety and grandeur of some of the intricate Celtic crosses and beautifully detailed statues watching over the cemetery makes for an incredibly interesting visit.

Ashton Lane

Ashton Lane in Glasgow’s fashionable West End is a pretty cobbled street just off Byres Road. Home to some lively bars and restaurants the lane has a real continental feel with fairy lights and lots of outdoor seating in the summer.

The lane even has its own movie palace. The Grosvenor Cinema first opened in 1921 and has gone through a number of refurbishments over the years.

Ashton Lane

Photo by Kenny Lam/VisitScotland

Equipped with two screens, each with a seating capacity of 100, the venue has a reputation for offering a range of events. Along with the adjacent Grosvenor Café, serving a variety of food and drinks, the cinema provides more than just a great movie experience.

Pre or post a trip to the movie theatre Ashton Lane offers a great extension to a day or night out with plenty of character and a great choice of different flavours and styles of food and drinks. And, it’s all just short walk from Byres Road subway station.

Britannia Panopticon

Glasgow has a number of theatres offering an impressive range of homegrown and touring productions but what’s less well known is that the city is home to the world’s oldest surviving music hall, the Britannia Panopticon.

Located above an amusement centre in the city centre’s Trongate the Britannia first opened in 1857. Untouched and neglected for years it has been given a new lease of life providing a glimpse of the Victorian Music Hall era.

Glasgow’s answer to ‘The Greatest Showman’, A E Pickard, changed the theatre’s name to the Panoptican, affectionately known by native Glaswegians as the Pots and Pans, in 1906. It’s thought he was inspired after seeing PT Barnum’s travelling show and he added a carnival, freak show, zoo and wax works to the building, each located on a different floor.

By 1896 moving pictures had been added to the programme and at the height of its success the Panoptican entertained up to 1500 people a day over a number of shows.

Britannia Music Hall, Glasgow

photo by Stinglehammer CC BY-SA 4.0

Throughout its 80 years of entertaining audiences in Glasgow many big names of the Music Hall stage appeared at the Panopticon, including Harry Lauder, Cary Grant and Stan Laurel who debuted there in 1906.

Beneath the salacious joviality of the Music Hall there was a darker undertone. Criminal gangs were known to frequent the Panopticon and the crowds of working men were a draw for the city’s prostitutes.

By 1938 tastes had changed and the Panopticon closed its doors and its colourful, often bawdy performances were over. Following its closure the music hall was bought by a tailor and became a shop and warehouse.

During the Second World War part of the building was used as a chicken farm to provide eggs. Fortunately the balcony and upper auditorium were left intact.

In the 1990s a charitable body, the Friends of the Britannia Panopticon Music Hall Trust, was formed to restore the theatre and today it once again offers a range of performances including traditional music hall shows, comedy and classic cinema.

Clydeside Distillery

A relatively new addition to the city Clydeside Distillery is the first single malt distillery to be built in Glasgow for over a century.

It is situated on the banks of the river from which it takes its name and is within easy walking distance of the Scottish Exhibition Centre, the Hydro performance venue and the Riverside Museum.

The Distillery opened to visitors in 2017 and offers tours and an excellent shop stocking an extensive range of whiskies – a real treasure trove for the enthusiast.

A tour of Clydeside Distillery, Glasgow

Photo by Peter Dibdin/VisitScotland

Housed within the old Pumphouse building on Queen’s Dock the new distillery pays homage to Glasgow’s industrial past and the city’s role at the centre of world trade during the 19th and 20th centuries. The history of Queen’s Dock forms part of the tour and gives a real sense of the bustling port in years gone by while the tasting room offers excellent views over the River Clyde.

The Morrison family, well known in the whisky industry with Morrison Bowmore Distillers and Auchentoshan Whisky within their portfolio, oversaw an extensive refurbishment to create Clydeside Distillery.

It take at least three years of maturing in oak barrels before a spirit can be legally called whisky and as the first casks were filled in 2017 it won’t be long before visitors can buy a bottle or two, putting Glasgow once again firmly on the whisky map.