Keppie at 170: Fairfield Shipbuilding & Engineering Offices

Fairfield Shipyard and Engineering Offices is a notable example of how an architectural practice like Honeyman and Keppie would rely on the patronage of wealthy clients who commissioned multiple buildings over many years based on the strength of personal relationships.

John Honeyman’s merchant father probably introduced him to one of his first clients, the prominent shipbuilder and engineer James R. Napier. Honeyman carried out works to Napier’s house in Newton Place in 1856, and thus began a lasting relationship between the architect and the Napier family.

Many aspiring young men were apprenticed to the Napiers. One of these was John Elder, the third son of David Elder who had built Robert Napier’s first marine engine in 1822 for a boat named the Leven. In 1852, John Elder went into partnership with Charles Randolph …

forming the shipbuilding company that would become Fairfields. After John Elder died in 1869, Honeyman designed Elder’s funeral monument at the Necropolis on the hill opposite Glasgow Cathedral, alongside many family members and other notable families from Victorian Glasgow society.

Following Elder’s death, his sole ownership of the shipyard passed to his wife, Isabella. For nine months, she alone bore responsibility for one of the largest shipbuilding companies in the world, employing almost 5,000 men, until she was joined on the board by John Jamieson and William Pearce.

The name of the company was changed from Randolph Elder and Co. to Fairfield Shipbuilding and Engineering Co. Ltd. in 1885 by Pearce. It was named after the former farm he re-structured in order to be able to bid for naval tenders.

The driving force behind the shipping business at that time – and probably the initial advocate for commissioning the new offices – was Sir William Pearce. His portrait still hangs in the boardroom. He was sole owner of the business from 1878, and a member of parliament for Govan from 1885.

Through his connections, Honeyman received work from both board members: from Jamieson, a house at Shandon, near Helensburgh, and from Pearce (or rather his son) in 1890 for new shipyard offices on Govan Road at a cost of £15,562.

The red sandstone offices which present an imposing frontage to Govan Road were built for the Fairfield Shipbuilding and Engineering Co. Ltd. At the time the building was completed, the company was one of the leading shipbuilding yards on the River Clyde.

The company’s distinguished status was reflected in a prominent exhibition stand in the Main Hall at the first Glasgow Exhibition in 1888. Amongst the early special events held in the offices were the launch parties for the Cunard liners Campania and Lucania in 1892 and 1893.

“With Honeyman having taken on John Keppie as a partner just over a year earlier, this was the largest project that the practice had carried out. The relationship between Honeyman and his patrons, the Napiers and Elders can be seen in the body of work carried out around the context of the Fairfield offices.

Between 1864, when Govan became a burgh, and the time when the Fairfield offices were commissioned, the local population rose from 9,058 to over 56,000 with four shipbuilding and engineering yards being established. Elder Park – laid out by Honeyman, following a philanthropic award by Isabella Elder – became the centre of an industrial community that was the undisputed leader of world shipbuilding.

Honeyman completed several notable projects in Govan during this period of growth. There was accommodation for 350 people at Govan Free Church in 1862, subsequently converted to a theatre and music hall. Dean Park Parish Church, and the adjacent Dean Park Baptist Church in 1872 and 1877 respectively.

St Anthony’s Roman Catholic Church in 1879 still stands, although Oatlands Trinity and Elder Park churches have been demolished. A monument to Pearce, and Fairfield Public School, which opened in 1875, and housed 1775 children completed these significant projects for the practice in the fifteen years leading up to the design of the Fairfield Offices.

It could be argued that the foundation for the practice that would become Honeyman, Keppie and Mackintosh was laid in Govan. Whilst Honeyman secured the commission, Keppie led the project, and Mackintosh is believed to have assisted him in one of his first projects as a young draughtsman.

We’re very proud that such a significant building in the development of Glasgow’s industrial heritage continues to serve its local community more than 130 years after it opened, repurposed as a flagship project symbolising Govan’s regeneration.”

Text extracts taken from ‘Mackintosh and Co’, by David Stark, and with thanks to Fairfield Heritage.

Fairfield Shipbuilding & Engineering Offices: A personal perspective by Paul Sweeney MSP. Member of the Scottish Parliament for Glasgow (Labour & Co-operative)

I was first captivated by the Fairfield building as a boy, when going to see the launch of a ship that my dad had been building in Govan shipyard in the 1990s. The grandeur and scale of the main red sandstone frontage to Govan Road was immediately impressive and conveyed a sense of pride in the industry. Even at that young age, I was proud to be associated with this great shipbuilding community.

I was reacquainted with the building in 2011 when I started working at the shipyard in Govan. The building had fallen into disuse in the early 2000s and social enterprise, Govan Workspace, were about to begin work to renovate it into a heritage centre and office studios. I supported the project as an ‘extra-curricular’ activity to my day job, scouring through basements, cupboards and attic spaces in the shipyard for old models, artwork and furnishings to take to the new heritage centre for display. These included the centrepiece electrolier in the lobby, which is from the old boardroom of the Blythswood Shipbuilding Company in Scotstoun, the model of the Sea Launch Commander that my dad had helped build, and the old boardroom table from Yarrow Shipbuilders, which had most recently been on board HMS Duncan during her sea trials!

Volunteering with the team that brought the building back to life also gave me an appreciation for just how pioneering it was. This is most potently symbolised by the figures of a shipwright and a marine engineer flanking the main entrance, sculpted by James Pittendrigh Macgillivray. The integration of shipbuilding and marine engineering was first conceived by John Elder in the 1860s and manifested in the layout of Fairfield, which was the world’s first modern integrated shipyard and marine engine works. With only minor alterations the plan of the present shipyard survives largely as John Elder conceived it.

His statue in Elder Park across Govan Road, erected by public subscription in 1888, with the park originally laid out to a scheme by John Honeyman, carries the inscription: “By his many inventions, particularly in connection with the compound engine, he effected a revolution in engineering second only to that accomplished by James Watt, and in great measure, originated the developments in steam propulsion which have created modern commerce” and: “His unwearied efforts to promote the welfare of the working classes, his integrity of character, firmness of purpose, and kindness of heart, claim, equally with his genius, enduring remembrance”.

The spectacular offices by John Keppie, commissioned under Elder’s successor Sir William Pearce, are the culmination of his vision for this iconic industry in Glasgow, with Fairfield growing to be the city’s greatest shipyard. The relationship of Honeyman, Keppie, Elder and Pearce during this period is an immensely powerful expression of Glasgow’s genius during a ‘gilded age’ where industrial innovation was given extraordinary expression in the architecture of the shipyard.