Name: The Broken Building That Must Not Be Destroyed
Uploaded: 2020-04-01T01:12:16.000Z
Duration: 4 min 59 s
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This is St Peter's Seminary, about an hour west of Glasgow in Scotland.

Adverbs of degree

Basic passive voice

It was built in the 1960s to be a training school for priests,

and I think it's a beautiful ruin of a building.

But then, I like Modernist architecture like this.

In 1992, this was put on the list of historic Scottish buildings

in category A, which means that it's of national or international importance.

And architecturally, it is one of the most important modern buildings in Scotland.

But, by the time it was listed, it had already been closed for years.

The Catholic church had decided that priests should train in towns and cities,

There weren't as many people who wanted to be priests.

No one was interested in buying the place, and the church couldn't afford to keep

an empty and extremely high-maintenance building running for no purpose.

One of the troubles with a unique structure like this

is that it's expensive and difficult to keep repaired.

So, a quarter of a century later, what's left looks... rough.

- The Archdiocese of Glasgow has been responsible for it

It was building which was very difficult to reuse,

No developer wanted a building that had a huge, concrete chapel in it.

We have a responsibility to try and preserve the ruin, as best we can.

It is now a ruin. It's covered in graffiti, it's inaccessible, it's dangerous.

We have, by statute, to try and maintain some kind of security

But after 40 years, we are at our wits' end.

In 40 years we have worked with every imaginable idea.

Developers have thought of turning it into a community centre,

or a hotel complex, and everything in between.

There were inherent weaknesses in the building.

Those who lived there have nightmarish stories of water ingress, for example,

of the fact that the wind would blow so strongly through the windows,

that curtains would be lifted to be almost horizontal.

So the building itself was not an easy building to live in or work in,

which made it even more difficult to find an alternative use for it.

- One arts organisation spent millions on making it safer,

removing asbestos and old fittings, using it as a stage for light shows,

And besides, by design, this building's in the middle of nowhere.

There's a village a mile down the road, but that's it.

And there's no way in law to just abandon a building like this.

You can 'tjust decide that it doesn't spark joy anymore

because it's a really significant, listed building.

- So it's not just a listed building, it's a grade A listed building.

It's the highest form of listing possible, and we are required to stick to

all sorts of rules about not using it for any alternative purpose,

not amending it, trying to keep the area around safe.

Legally, we would give that building away, with the estate, but whoever takes it on

takes on responsibility for insurance, for security, for upkeep and so on.

So it's not so easy. You literally can't give it away.

There have been expressions of interest, but when it comes down to it,

Because the building itself swallows vast amounts of money,

and even to maintain it in its current ruined state,

costs the Archdiocese something like £60,000 a year.

People have looked at the area around, because it's on a beautiful estate.

They have looked at perhaps building houses there

But that has been denied because there are greenbelt issues which prevent that, too.

And so there's something tragic about it, there's something haunting about it.

It's unrealistic to expect some sort of deus ex machina.

We remain open to working with anyone who wants to come forward with plans, with ideas,

but at the same time, realistically, this is bigger than us.

This is something for the state, something for the nation.

Those that understand buildings, and that have an understanding of

brutalist architecture, would see it as an extraordinary treasure.

- If this was centuries old, rather than decades,

The Scottish government would probably pay to restore it.

Parents would bring their kids to picnic in the grounds.

And the idea of spraying graffiti on it would be abhorrent.

Despite the fact that this is a one-of-a-kind historic religious building.

This place has enormous historical and cultural value

And that, it turns out, is a very difficult place to be in.