Steven Holl completes the Reid Building, the latest addition to the Glasgow School of Art campus

Photograph captured from the corner of hill street with blurred image of 2 people walking on the street and on the right 3 buildings with the Reid building in the center.
American architect Steven Holl has designed a contemporary addition to the Glasgow School of Art's campus, the Reid Building, which will house the school's design department
(Image credit: Steven Holl)

The Glasgow School of Art (GSA) is famous for its Charles Rennie Mackintosh-designed 1909 building, but soon there will be one more reason for architecture buffs to flock to the northern city. American architect Steven Holl has designed a contemporary addition to the school's campus, the Reid Building, which will house the GSA's design department. 

Named after the Dame Seona Reid who stood down as director of the GSA last summer, the building sits opposite the art school (which will remain in the Mackintosh building) and the architecture school (located around the corner from these two, and to the west). The new structure is unfussy and monochrome, featuring an external skin of semi-transparent acid etched glass panels with a green tint - which is in fact the glass' natural colour. The building's only other splash of colour is GSA alumni Martin Boyce's stunning coloured glass art piece, which adorns the main entrance. 

The design and building process was quick and efficient. 'The concepts we started with are still there,' says project architect Chris McVoy. The new addition's massing was designed to complement and echo Mackintosh's masterpiece, however, in its structure, the building's concept was reversed. As McVoy explains, the Mackintosh building has a 'thick skin and a thin frame', made from stone and metal respectively. In contrast, the Reid building features a thin skin with little adornment and a thick, robust concrete frame. Its white, sculptural interiors are simple and almost raw, providing an appropriately blank canvas for the students' creative work. 

It is, however, a very technological building, its arcs and sweeping curves created with state-of-the-art digital and concrete technology and painstaking precision. 'We push the technology of our day, as Mackintosh pushed the craft of his day,' explains McVoy. Three 'driven voids of light' cut through the structure acting as large light shafts and helping with natural air circulation. Their base also provides unexpected breakout spaces for relaxation and socialising. Additionally, as McVoy explains, throughout the building 'the circulation space is also a place for social interaction'. 

The layout is easy to read, designed across seven levels and housing workshop areas, offices, galleries and an auditorium. Big, north facing windows light the studio spaces and a café on the third level spills out to a green terrace overlooking the Mackintosh building. 'The studios are the building blocks of our design - the forms are determined by how the light comes in,' explains McVoy, 'and the Mackintosh building was our starting point'. 

The school is gearing up towards its new building's official inauguration this April. As well as seeing the new structure - created with the help of local firm JM Architects and Arup Engineering - visitors will now be able to see the original building from different angles too. 'We made an effort to create new views of the Mackintosh building,' says McVoy, paying fitting homage to the great Scottish master's work. 

The Reid Building on the left (across the street) from the Charles Rennie Mackintosh building

The Reid Building sits across the street from the GSA's classic Charles Rennie Mackintosh building and wraps around the existing students' union building

(Image credit: Steven Holl)

Side view of the Reid Building featuring black framed windows

The students' union building's interiors were redesigned by JM Architects, who acted as the local architect for this project 

(Image credit: Steven Holl)

People walking down a street with building on both sides and bicycles parks on the side of the road.

Named after the Dame Seona Reid who stood down as director of the GSA last summer, the new structure is unfussy and monochrome, featuring an external skin of semi-transparent, acid etched glass panels with a green tint - which is in fact the glass' natural colour

(Image credit: Steven Holl)

On the left is a big brown bricked building with caged like windows and on the right odf the building is a building featuring glass natural tint design . Cars parked on the side of the road.

The glass' natural tint was retained to complement the Mackintosh Building's orange-hewed stones 

(Image credit: Steven Holl)

A tunnel shaft-like opening at in the ceiling of a building

Three 'driven voids of light' cut through the structure, acting as large light shafts and helping with natural air circulation 

(Image credit: Steven Holl)

A view from the top of a tunnel designed seating area

Their base also provides unexpected breakout spaces for relaxation and socialising

(Image credit: Steven Holl)

A room with white windows and walls with white tables and orange chairs.

The internal layout was driven by the light's orientation and the studios, which were the design's 'building blocks', according to the architects

(Image credit: Steven Holl)

A curved white wall in the corridor of a building. on the left is the door that leads to a studio

It is however, a very technological building, its arcs and sweeping curves created with state-of-the-art digital and concrete technology and painstaking precision

(Image credit: Steven Holl)

Equipments on display in a studio with white ceilings and walls and big north facing windows

Big, north facing windows light the studio spaces...

(Image credit: Steven Holl)

An open space in the building with white wall and floor to ceiling windows (divided with grey steel). by the windows are beech coloured tables and chairs which is partly occupied with people sitting. On the left of the seating area is a peek of the staircase and a lobby area

... while a café on the third level spills out to a green terrace overlooking the Mackintosh building

(Image credit: Steven Holl)

Blurred image of one person coming down stairs and another person at the top of the staircase. The staircase has glass banisters and the walls in the space is all white. There is a peek of the upper stair case above.

The layout is easy to read, designed across seven levels and housing workshop areas, offices, galleries and an auditorium; the circulation spaces were also important 

(Image credit: Steven Holl)

A blurred image of a man in all black on the last flight of grey staircase with grey banisters. Beech coloured chais and square tables on the left. Above it a balcony view of the upper floor.

The new building will be inaugurated this April

(Image credit: Steven Holl)

Ellie Stathaki is the Architecture & Environment Director at Wallpaper*. She trained as an architect at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki in Greece and studied architectural history at the Bartlett in London. Now an established journalist, she has been a member of the Wallpaper* team since 2006, visiting buildings across the globe and interviewing leading architects such as Tadao Ando and Rem Koolhaas. Ellie has also taken part in judging panels, moderated events, curated shows and contributed in books, such as The Contemporary House (Thames & Hudson, 2018), Glenn Sestig Architecture Diary (2020) and House London (2022).