Punch Taverns has announced plans to invest over £3m in its Scottish estate over the next 12 months while Star Pubs & Bars have pledged to spend £2m. The two pub companies, which between them are responsible for more than 300 pubs, are refurbishing and improving outside areas.
Punch’s Operations Director Scotland, Brian Davidson said, “Tourism and the economy in Scotland are particularly buoyant and we have seen a growing demand for good quality hotel accommodation coupled with traditional Scottish hospitality. Our hotels and pubs are all in prime locations and refurbishment schemes have been designed to make the most of the site’s heritage whilst celebrating locally sourced food and drink. From traditional wet-led sites to award winning gastro pubs, our Scottish estate has it all.”
Over recent months, Punch has invested £500k in developing the 16 bedroom Crown Hotel in Stornoway and £1m in the 24 bedroom Portree Hotel on the Isle of Skye.
During 2016, the company plans to further develop key hotel sites in the North, Central Belt and Borders along with a number of pub sites throughout Scotland.
Meanwhile Star Pubs & Bars is planning to spend, where possible, prior to the peak summer trading months and, in pubs with a reputation for sport, in time for Euro 2016. It has put aside nearly £500K to improving the outside of 19 of its pubs with The Hazeldene in Gretna Green one of the first to benefit. The pub has recently had a £220K refurbishment, and £40K of that was on the outside area. A 40 cover deck has been created with access to the main building through French doors and it also boasts a retractable canopy.
The development has helped to double the pub’s trading space, which will also allow the licensees, Paula Baillie and Kieran White, (pictured) to grow their function and wedding business.
Plans are in place for another 13 pubs to have their external areas redeveloped to increase their capacity and covers. A further six pubs will also be benefitting from new signage and external decorations to enhance their kerb appeal. Lawson Mountstevens, Star Pubs & Bars MD said, “These projects will meet customer demand for alfresco dining and boost pubs’ capacity for a relatively low spend. The outside of a pub is its shop window and if it looks great it will attract passing trade.”
The new Boclair House Hotel in Bearsden is now open. The latest addition to the Manorview Hotels & Leisure Group’s portfolio has had £3m lavished on it, and you can definitely see where the money has been spent at this new luxury boutique hotel. From the manicured garden out front with its pergola complete with a chandelier, to the sumptuous lounge bar, there is no doubt the residents of Bearsden and wedding planners will not be disappointed.
The new venue now boasts a stunning ballroom, a Parisian-styled restaurant and lounge bar, a private dining room and 12 luxurious bedroom suites.
In fact, the transformation is even more stunning when you take into account this was a former Municipal building, which although ‘B’ listed had almost no internal features at all.
The building was constructed in 1890, commissioned by three Buchanan sisters of Bellfield. It was called the Buchanan Retreat and provided accommodation for poorer members of the Buchanan clan in their declining year. Latterly, it became a home for elderly gentlemen until acquired by the Burgh of Bearsden and opened as the Municipal Buildings by Princess Margaret and Lord Snowdon in 1962. Most recently the building was used as an office by East Dunbartonshire Council.
The iconic building now has a glass entrance, and once you are through the glass entrance there are two further glass doors on either side leading to outside portico style terraced areas. These are not entirely enclosed due to the buildings listed status. These outside areas now boast small round marble tables and comfortable looking all weather chairs.
However, if you are heading into the hotel you still have a large wooden door to enter through. This takes you into an elegant spacious reception area with a striking maze-like patterned bespoke carpet of cream, black and gold. Immediately ahead of you is a grand staircase which leads to the bedrooms, and on the right is an original marble tiled wall which is one of the few remaining listed features of the building. It has inscribed upon it the names of former local Provosts. The marble and brass reception desk is situated to the left of the main entrance, and the rectangular inset chandeliers on the ceilings, add glamour and an art deco feel to the reception. This is further enhanced by the carving at the foot of the bannister and the specially created stained glass window which is located half way up the staircase.
Says Manorview Managing Director Steve Graham, “I stayed at the Hôtel Costes in Paris last year and I really like its style. We have taken some of the inspiration for the décor from there.”
Turning left past the reception area you will find yourself in the Ballroom bar area. This area features an opaque glass and brass bar with a tented rich chocolate coloured star cloth ceiling and chandelier. It has a bespoke beige carpet with a stunning swirly chocolate motif, which complements perfectly the dark wood panelling and heavy wooden doors. Immediately adjacent is the glamourous Ballroom. It boast ten glittering and spectacular LED chandeliers, supplied by Wired, glass pillars which inset with brass which in a diamond-shaped design. The pillars are also edged with brass. In fact, you will see the mirrored diamond glass and brass theme throughout the hotel. (I hope housekeeping has plenty of Brasso!) Another feature in this area, and which features around the hotel, are the framed black and white photographs of famous brides and grooms.
The main Ballroom which can accommodate 16 x tables of 11, plus top table, features the same carpet with parquet flooring between the areas to allow the carpet to be lifted to create a dancing area. It has large, almost floor to ceiling, windows on two sides with bronze hanging beaded curtains giving the room a degree of privacy. Says Steve, “I think the main suite is my favourite area.”
Well, my favourite area is still to come – Annabel’s. The Parisian-styled art-deco lounge bar and restaurant which is located to the right hand side of the reception area. It is everything you would imagine a sumptuous Parisian bar and restaurant would be. From the red velvet drapes that greet you, as you enter, to the fringed red wall lights, and the charcoal and gold damask wallpaper. It boasts rich red velvet chairs with fringing on the armrests and around the bottoms and square dark rosewood tables, edged with brass, with crystal table lights a top. This combined with an art deco style carpet in shades of grey, deep red and black, and a back wall which features a library-style shelving above rich red velvet banquette seating, and bric a brac of the era – vintage telephones glassware and ornaments, creates a warm and luxurious room.
The piece de resistance though is the ornate rosewood, glass and brass back bar. It’s traditional but with the modern element of the cut glass and brass shelving. Down below there is a bank of four stainless steel fridges. The bar top is brushed zinc with a rounded edge while the bottom of the bar features copper and studded panelling. Adorning the bar, on either side are two lamps with red fringed lampshades. These lamps also appear in the library area at the back of the bar.
The antique feel carries through to some of the bar ware used – the copper shakers and strainers, look the part. Framed pictures with the feel of the Moulin Rouge set the scene and are lit by antique style uplighters and low-lighters.
There are three large windows framed with rich velvet curtains and fringed pelmets. The window wall has a vintage wallpaper on the bottom half which looks like it part of the plasterwork. It is dark grey with a brushed gold motif. It is subtle but totally in keeping with the feel of the room.
Even the menus come in a copper cover…
You just have to visit the Ladies… I don’t think I’ve ever seen such a sumptuous Ladies room in Scotland. Each cubicle has its own chandelier and a padded velvet wall at the back. It’s certainly a wee bit out of the ordinary.
Annabel’s has its own kitchen which also caters for the private dining room which is separated from the bar area by an archway and velvet curtains. The traditional rosewood dining table in this room fits perfectly with the character of the building.
Upstairs is just as sumptuous. At the top of the stairs, there is an oval balustrade which overlooks the reception area and which has a striking chandelier. Says Steve, “Originally the designers, Space I.D., wanted to glass this over, but I preferred it open.”
The heavy wooden doors and dark green walls, the bespoke carpets and brass lights create an almost understated elegance. The names of the suites being projected onto the wooden entrance area in front of each door is a nice touch. All the rooms are named after Scottish islands, however, the suites themselves have more of a French theme with regard to the beautiful embossed wallpapers, and sumptuous soft furnishings. Each has been individually styled and all feature stand-out bathrooms with a variety baths ranging from claw bathtubs to a copper round bath in the wedding suite. Each room has delightful cornice which looks like it has always been there, but which in fact was created for each room.
The wedding suite has French-style furniture and the most spectacular shower-come-bathroom you are every likely to see! Set in the original tower part of the building this room boasts exposed stone walls which stretch more than 20 feet, a round spiral staircase (which is roped off, but which would take you up the tower) and a square shower which is set in the middle of the room and which looks more like a feature light. It’s certainly romantic and different. I can imagine magazines wanting to rent it for photo shoots!
All the rooms come with Tvs, not just in the main rooms but in the bathrooms too and top of the range coffee facilities.
The hotel has definitely got off to a busy start, with the first wedding taking place in April 2016 and a further 78 weddings and special occasions booked, up until the end of 2017.
Steve concludes, “We are delighted to be opening Boclair House Hotel. It is a stunning venue and we expect to host many happy occasions over the years. The fact that we already have bookings for 78 weddings and special occasions shows the level of interest in this stunning new venue.”
New GM Mark Currie is also looking forward to the challenge, “I just love the hotel. Everything has been thought about , no corners have been cut. I think that shows. We are delighted to be open and welcoming our first guests. I think we have a great team, and we certainly have a fabulous venue.”
He is not wrong!
When Colin Beattie first took me around Kelvinside Parish Church, which was to become Oran Mor, pigeons were still nesting in the rafters and the basement was flooded. He painted a picture of a venue which he hoped would become a firm fixture in Glasgow’s West End and part of Glasgow’s culture. Before he could start building, however, 13 tonnes of guana… (that’s bird droppings to you and me!) had to be removed!
Eighteen months later the venue opened, but from day one it grabbed and held the attention of all that visited it. I don’t think anyone, except for perhaps Colin, would have imagined that a decade later not only is Oran Mor an iconic Glasgow venue but it is famous the World over. In fact it is hard to imagine it not being there. It definitely lives up to its definition the ‘great melody of life’.
Annually around a million people pass through its doors – at capacity the building caters for in the region of 2000 people but as General Manager Sandy Gourlay explains, “We count people in and out, and by 8pm at the weekend we can have had 1,400 through the doors, and that’s not counting our evening customers.”
Oran Mor’s first event in the auditorium was Colin’s daughters wedding, and since then it has played host to loads more weddings of all shapes and sizes. In fact my own mum re-married there. It has played host to conferences, product launches, charity functions, and concerts of famous and not so famous artists. The success of the venue has filtered down to the events that it supports such as “A Play, a Pie and a Pint”. This lunch-time theatre has been credited with putting the oomph back into Scottish theatre. It has provided an outlet for creative talent in Scotland. As a result theatre here is thriving.
When Oran Mor launched in 2004 the investment was somewhere in the region of £6.5m, and since then a further £3m has been spent. Says Colin Beattie, “We’ve spent over £9m, but with a million people coming through our doors every year, it has been worth every penny.”
I asked him where he first got the idea from. Says Colin, “The concept came from the experience I had working for Mayfest. From the mid-80’s to the mid-90’s I was involved in its operation with Billy Kelly. We were the first to use the Fruit Market as a venue and we built and created the Renfrew Ferry. We put on a variety of different acts from comedy with folk like Jo Brand, Lily Savage and Rory Bremner to live music such as the Tom Robinson band and Nina Simone. In fact the Renfrew Ferry probably played host to Scotland’s first ever Karaoke night too. The success we had at Mayfest gave me the idea for a venue like Oran Mor. I wanted to run a Mayfest all year round. I looked at the Partick Market which was too small, and the old Creme de la Creme. But when I heard that the Kelvinside Parish Church was for sale I jumped at the opportunity. It was the ideal building in which to create a ‘built for purpose’ venue. We created it so that we could have five events going on simultaneously.”
When the venue opened, with a capacity of 2,000, it became one of the biggest venues ever to open in Scotland. At the time I remember some fellow members of the licensed trade suggesting that it would never do the revenue needed for the upkeep. The thought of bringing in revenue of £100K a week seemed out of the realms of possibility. To put it into perspective, at the time The Horseshoe was still Glasgow’s most popular pub and on a good week did £40K… but right from the off Oran Mor did just that. Says General Manager, Sandy Gourlay, “We consistently do well in excess of that now.”
The success of the venue is down, there is no doubt, to its versatility. The Grand Auditorium with its meticulously hand-painted ceiling and walls by Alisdair Gray, depicting Birth, Life and Death, as well as various philosophical quotations on the meaning of life, is a work in progress, and it probably always will be. It is Scotland’s biggest piece of public art. Says Colin, “It is spectacular.” I agree.
However, Colin explains, Alisdair is not the only artist to have his work displayed at Oran Mor – Bill Blackwood, Adrian Wiszniewski, Sandy Moffat, John Clark, Sheila Tandy, Lizzie Lockhart, Jim Lambie and Ranald McCall – to name but a few, have contributed to stained glassworks, murals, sculptures and paintings. There is also a major piece of work by George Wylie ‘Mitigation of Woe’. Says Colin, “It lifts my spirits.”
The venue in the basement not only hosts the award winning A Play, a Pie and a Pint lunchtime theatre, but evening performers have included Joss Stone, Simply Red, Patti Smith, James Grant, Dr Hook, The Proclaimers and Amy Winehouse and too many others to mention. The Private Dining Room (PDR) is one of Scotland’s most coveted private dining venues, while the Brasserie Late Night bar is an institution in the city. The John Muir room is set to come into its own this year with a small refurbishment planned.
But back to A Play, a Pie and a Pint – an initiative that rose out of the success of Oran Mor and which has gone on to almost single-handedly restore the fortunes of Scottish theatre. David Maclennan brought the original idea to Colin and he didn’t just embrace it, he has backed it over the last decade and is proud of its success. Colin comments, “We are just about to enter the Guinness Book of Records for the most amounts of original plays staged in a season.” While Director David Maclennan says, “Over the last ten years Oran Mor has become an oasis for artists, musicians, writers and actors. It’s been a wonderful place to work and a great place to relax. It may not have an Arts Centre sign above the door but it’s the busiest venue of its kind in Scotland. I’ve been incredibly lucky to work there with Colin Beattie and Sandy Gourlay, his General Manager, and all their staff and it’s their support which has made A Play, a Pie and a Pint the success it has become. Shows from PPP have been performed from Australia to Alaska, from Beirut to the Bahamas, from the Netherlands to New York and almost everywhere in between – where Oran Mor leads, the rest of the world follows.”
While writer Ian Pattison comments, “David MacLennan and Colin Beattie are both risk takers who are used to seeing their ideas, however mad, coming to life. Promoting lunchtime theatre in a converted church must have seemed like an excellent opportunity to lose money, hair and sleep so naturally, being visionaries, they leapt at the chance. To the amazement of everyone, except themselves, the idea has worked. A Play, a Pie and a Pint, or PP&P as we aficionados call it, is now in with the bricks and the stained glass windows as an integral part of the nation’s cultural scene. People learn and practise their craft thanks to PP&P. Just as important, they eat and pay their rent thanks to it too.
Now Oran Mor and A Play, a Pie and a Pint are ten years old. If we’re not careful, we’ll have a Scottish success story on our hands.” He concludes, “PP&P has ensured that for a generation of Scottish writers the taste of mutton pies is for us what madeleines were to Proust.”
The bar itself at Oran Mor is a one off. The gantry is a mix of oak and mirrors and authentic cooperate whisky barrels moulded in to the design. It also features a ‘snuff mull’ which Colin admits dictated the whole design of the gantry, with the four barrels signifying the four whisky regions.
The walls are adorned with paintings of customers past and present, while the panels on the ceiling have been hand-painted.
Says Herald diarist Ken Smith, “I could tell you about the quirky objects in the bar, the quality of the fittings in Oran Mor, the extensive range of drinks, but in truth it’s the folk you meet in Oran Mor that make it. I walked in last week and within five minutes someone had come over to tell me a story for the Herald Diary, an actress had told me what show she was about to do, and an old friend came over to say she had hoped to bump into me. And all this was before I’d even sipped from my first pint. It’s a home from home.”
His view is shared by the thousands of people who come through the doors every week for a wee drink or two. Unusually it is one of the few bars in the city, which despite the name meaning ‘The Big Song’, doesn’t play music – it’s the music of the chatter that makes Oran Mor sing.
John Gemmell of Heineken comments, “I cannot believe it is now 10 years since we embarked on the journey with Colin to support him with the building of Oran Mor. He had incredible imagination and vision from the very beginning and talked about how he thought it might evolve. He has created a space that continues to intrigue. At Heineken we are immensely proud to have Oran Mor as a showcase for our beers and ciders. Oran Mor is a living and breathing entity that has become an icon in Glasgow. I am convinced that the next 10 years will be every bit as interesting.”
Colin also believes the success that Oran Mor enjoys is down to the people that work there. He says, “Many of our staff have come up through the ranks and the people featured on the cover have all been responsible in their own way for helping me build Oran Mor into the success story it now is.”
Everyone who knows Colin knows that he is famous for collecting unusual items – and Oran Mor is the perfect place to display them. From the former SFA table in the private dining room to the writing desk formerly owned by Cockburns Of Leith which was allegedly used by Sir Walter Scott. There is also a sculpture of Chic Murray and Billy Connolly created by David Annan, just waiting to be erected on the North side of the building. Says Colin, “It is completed, and cost in the region of £100K, but it is currently in storage as I am still waiting for planning permission.”
When I ask Colin what was his most memorable event at Oran Mor was he hesitates, “There have been so many” and then said, “I think the charity events that the likes of James Grant, Bobby Bluebell and Justin Curry put on are all memorable. We have always endorsed charity nights under the Spirit Aid banner. This charity, run by David Hayman, is our charity of choice and we have donated a converted ambulance.” Colin has just received the honour of becoming a keeper of the Quaich and he fully intends to uphold the tradition of promoting whisky to all. Says Colin, “It was a tremendous honour. I think our whisky awards are a real success story and this year we will launch our own Oran Mor Whisky. I am also planning on opening a new Whisky Emporium in Glasgow.”
As for guests that have been a pleasure to entertain at Oran Mor Colin says one of his favourites was Kate Moss, and recalls how Amy Winehouse said the Private dining room was the plushest dressing room she ever had.
Colin believes that the reason that Oran Mor is so much part of Scotland’s culture today is because it is a “coverall”. He explains, “It is a real social hub that caters for everyone.” He concludes, “The success of Oran Mor has also come about because of its affiliations to my other pubs Granny Gibbs, the Lismore and the Ben Nevis. We create safe environments for people to enjoy.”
Ten years in and there is no stopping him. Next month the Oran Mor Hotel opens, and it will include serviced apartments. He also has plans for a new sculpture; there is a rumour it might be of two whippets!!
Annabel’s has its own kitchen which also caters for the private dining room which is separated from the bar area by an archway and velvet curtains. The traditional rosewood dining table in this room fits perfectly with the character of the building.
The hotel has definitely got off to a busy start, with the first wedding taking place in April 2016 and a further 78 weddings and special occasions booked, up until the end of 2017.