Merchant City Gateways, Glasgow

Graven designed and managed the implementation of gateway signage for Glasgow’s culture and leisure quarter, The Merchant City.

The work was commissioned in conjunction with a streetscaping and shopfront refurbishment programme. The objective of the project was to develop awareness of the Merchant City, and to create differentiation with other parts of the City Centre. The process involved research to establish an understanding of existing perceptions of the area, its characteristics and boundaries, as well as circulation and usage patterns.

Recommendations involved marking the corners of the area and ‘borrowing’ existing architectural features to create distinct entry and exit points. A system of pavement set plaques supports information about the ordinary heritage of the area, which is largely unknown. This was called ‘The Obscure History of the Merchant City’.

An important design objective for the project was to give distinctiveness to the place without resorting to hackneyed ‘branding’ strategies.

10m high stainless steel signs incorporating lighting visibly mark the four corners of the Merchant City area and suspended signs mark the existing entrances. The pavement plaques are cast in bronze. The typography is designed to feel like part of the existing local architecture.