Art Exhibition | Power from the Glens

An early version of one of architect James Shearer’s designs for the Hydro Board is almost lost, at first glance, in this typically colourful representation of a woodland setting by Glasgow landscape artist William Douglas Macleod. Shearer’s 1950s power stations deliberately took a contextual approach, and Macleod’s painting shows how they were intended to blend in.

Built in the early 1960s to James Shearer’s architectural designs, Kilmorack is the final dam on the Affric/Beauly scheme, with an integrated generating station. The executed design is larger than that shown here. It sits off-centre in the middle ground of the image, screened by trees, as a clear statement of its contextualism.

This dam regulates the flow of water to Fasnakyle Power Station and was – as the drawing alludes to – designed to be hard to see within an area of particular natural beauty. It is located at a narrow point in the valley in order to minimise its visual impact. Faced in concrete, a slightly projecting central section rises to the control tower which, as built in 1951, has simple heraldic ornament.

Fasnakyle Power Station – shown here in an early iteration – was designed by James Shearer and opened in 1952 by Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh. The size of the buildings reflects the fact that they were intended as the control centre for the Affric/Beauly scheme. Architecturally it is typical of Shearer’s contextualism, with stone elevations in a simplified classicism. A number of panels of carved ornament, by the noted artist Hew Lorimer, illustrate Pictish lore and reflect the continued influence of Scotland’s Arts and Crafts traditions.

Completed in 1955 and located on the shores of Loch Tay, this image shows a design by the Glasgow architects Gratton & McLean, who also designed a number of churches and schools in the 1950s and 1960s. Their body of work demonstrates how small architectural practices could sustain themselves on a diet of public sector commissions during the heyday of the post-1945 Welfare State. The painting, like many others commissioned by the NOSHEB, is by the prolific landscape artist Robert Eadie, who worked across Scotland during the first half of the 20^th century.

Another perspective by landscape artist Robert Eadie, which presents the dam’s setting as an inhabited place of human activity. By extension, the dam reads as a further human intervention in the landscape, and thus as something which is entirely in keeping with its surroundings.

One of the architect James Shearer’s designs, in his typically contextual, non-monumental style: modest in scale and faced in rubble stone. The station as built is very similar to this early design, although the pitched roof was omitted, and the detail of the windows was simplified in the final construction. Robert Eadie’s artistic perspective shows an image of bucolic continuity, with tradition/leisure (fishing) facing modernity/industry (the power station).

F.A Weemys – who worked with other architects for Sir Alexander Gibb’s engineering practice – produced the design shown here, which is more monumental than what was built. It seems almost to be bathed in a shaft of sunlight – or, perhaps whimsically, a spotlight powered by hydro-electricity. Looking back to the slender forms and large metal windows of 1930s buildings like Rothesay Pavilion and the Glasgow Empire Exhibition, there is a strong symmetry to the design, with its regular, centrally placed windows, but the small block to the left-hand side of the main building subverts that regularity.

When constructed, Torr Achilty was given a more contextual treatment, with rubblestone walls that create a stronger contrast with the smooth concrete surface of the dam behind than is apparent in this earlier proposal by the architect F.A. Weemys and others, whose focus emphasises the geometry and modernity of the infrastructure – notably the stepped fish ladder.

A straightforward structure finished in concrete, the slightly curved form of the dam as built is not apparent in this early perspective by architect F.A. Weemys, whose use of shadow dramatises the regular buttresses of the face of the dam.

The landscape is the star in this drawing: brooding mountains and wide-open space, with the dam presented as an almost inconspicuous addition. The loch supplies Foyers Power Station; the dam, finished in rubble stone, alludes to Scottish tradition with a castellated tower that evokes the popular Baronial style of the 19^th century.

Originally opened by a private company at the end of the 19^th century, the site was reconstructed in the early 1970s. This drawing shows an early design by James Shearer’s practice. It is more monumental and indeed contemporary than previous works by this practice, perhaps reflecting the retirement of James Shearer himself. The dark vertical window bands look rather like the columns of a classical portico.

A particularly impressionist image by Robert Eadie, in which the boulders which appear to be strewn across the foreground contrast with the smooth surface of the proposed dam.

As in Robert Eadie’s illustration of Lednock Dam, the Highlands are seen here as a place of human activity, with figures on the water’s edge, while the power station is presented as part of a sequence of interventions in the landscape which earlier included the bridge alongside. Its pitched roof and modest scale evoke, perhaps, traditional farm buildings, even as its regular window openings hint at its actual purpose.

Part of Scotland’s most northerly hydro scheme, the design shown here is relatively traditional in style, with blind arches above the windows. The final, executed design is less monumental, with rubblestone and a pitched roof, and a more rambling plan, though some fine carved panels, depicting Celtic beasts, nod to the Arts and Crafts movement.

This drawing is distinctive in that it focuses on the nearby village. In so doing, it emphasises the communities that will benefit from the introduction of more reliable electricity supplies. It also presents the Highland landscape as one of evolution and human intervention, with the dam fitting into a well-established pattern of change.

Commissioned in 1957, this small power station is shown as having a simplified classicism with its cubic form and symmetrical elevations. The proposed dam has an exaggeratedly smooth, almost pure surface which contrasts with the texture of the vegetation on the surrounding hillsides.

Clachan Power Station is largely underground, but here we see that it was proposed originally to be at the head of Loch Fyne. Though the power station was to be a substantial structure, the pitched roof and simple elevations mean that it looks rather like the nearby house, suggesting that it would blend into the landscape.

Sandwiched between Loch Lomond and the mountainside, the power station – seen here in an early design – almost gleams, with the regular rhythm of its architecture contrasting with the irregular landscape around. A different design, by the architect H.O. Tarbolton, was completed in 1950, its simple, classical-inspired architecture reflecting the way that this style was then associated with public sector buildings of all types.

The image hides the gentle curve which characterises the dam as it was constructed, but the vertical emphasis survived into the final design, and is dramatically illustrated here as a play of light and shade. Part of the Tummel scheme, it was completed in 1957.

This early version of the design for Errochty Power Station reveals the influence of classicism and also, perhaps, Art Deco style, in its projecting vertical fins. As built in 1955, a rather simpler (and no doubt more economical) design in rubble stone was constructed, hinting at a greater concern for the vernacular and the physical context, though its tall windows and asymmetries reveal the continued influence of this earlier design.

At the south end of the Tummel-Garry scheme of the late 1940s, Pitlochry Dam and Power Station demonstrate well NOSHEB’s early approach. The dam is unadorned, feeling appropriately functional. The generating station (to the left of the dam) was designed by H.O. Tarbolton in a more monumental style, with a simplified classicism which asserts its importance relative to the dam. It is seen here in an alternate design. Next to it is a fish ladder, a series of connected pools enabling fish to bypass the dam safely.

A particularly impressionist image by Robert Eadie, in which the boulders strewn across the foreground contrast with the smooth surface of the proposed dam.

This James Shearer design has a strongly horizontal character, which is almost exaggerated by the way that the drawing reads as a series of interlocking rectangles. The elevation is broken down into alternate sections of rubble stone and glass, showing how proportion and rhythm were at the core of Shearer’s approach.

A typical example of architect H.O. Tarbolton’s monumental approach to the early power stations, with the rhythms, forms and proportions of classical architecture reduced to abstract essentials. On the long east elevation, the main turbine hall is the dominant element. The main part of the hall with its five vertical windows and projecting ‘columns’ between is bookended by a more solid section, with ancillary spaces in the lower block to the side. On the south elevation, above the door, is a suggestion of the carved stonework typically used strategically by Tarbolton for decoration emphasis.

An early power station by architect James Shearer (1949), notable for the integrated stone lettering (next to the flagpole) and heraldic ornament (above the door to the left). Seen together with the simplified classical style of the building, there is a clear sense that the station was intended to be read as an important piece of public infrastructure.

The dam is reduced to its geometric essentials in this drawing, which presents various views of the structure, including the adjacent fish ladder, as well as sections through it. There is a clear sense of geometric order being brought to bear on the landscape, which is hinted at through the contour lines visible in the central aerial view.

These two drawings show both sides of the dam at Loch Sloy: the almost castle-like elevation facing the water, and on the reverse side the giant arches of the downstream face, which appears like a latter-day Roman aqueduct. The black car, just visible at the foot of the structure in the downstream view, gives a sense of the scale of the dam.

This plan shows the dam (to the left) and power station (right) spanning from one side of the valley to the other. The regularity and symmetry of the layout is especially clear, creating a strong contrast with the way in which the perspective drawing of the scheme, seen elsewhere in this exhibition, presents a more ‘organic’ view.

Dalchonzie is a small power station designed by Robert Hurd, a noted traditionalist architect in mid-20th century Scotland. His work was typically concerned with the idea of creating a new, decidedly ‘Scottish’ style. There is a degree of complexity to this design, seen in the multi-pitch roof, but, at the same time, the north and south elevations clearly suggest vernacular influence.

This 1956 drawing clearly shows the buttressing on both sides of the dam. It is one of only two diamond-headed buttress dams in Scotland, designed to take account of the risk of earthquakes from the adjacent Highland Boundary Fault.

Lochay was designed by the leading modernist architect Robert Matthew in 1955 and reflects his view that Scottish architecture could be both contemporary and contextual, without the vernacular or classical touches of earlier schemes. A crisply detailed box encloses the turbines; it makes a clear statement of modernity. And yet, the use of stone roots it in the landscape of Highland Scotland.

This 1957 drawing shows the evolution of James Shearer’s architectural approach, moving away from the classical monumentality of the late 1940s towards carefully arranged grids of square windows which evoke the ‘Festival of Britain’ style of the 1950s. In so doing, it situates the hydro programme within the wider architectural output of the 1950s public sector, and the economic, social and physical modernisation of Scotland desired by policymakers and other reformers.

The monumental yet simplified architectural classicism of H.O. Tarbolton’s power station is clear in this drawing of the executed scheme, which is more traditionally styled than the perspective shown elsewhere in the exhibition.