Glasgow Doors Open Days Festival
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What's happening at the Glasgow Doors Open Days Digital Festival

21/8/2020

 
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Get to know the buildings and untold stories we're unlocking in this year's digital festival.

At a time when our ability to explore our city is more restricted than usual, we've decided to take the Glasgow Doors Open Days Festival online for the first time. The world may be changing around us, but our participants are still here to open their doors and tell their stories to you. 

We're bringing you more than 100 digital events from Monday 14th - Sunday 20th September, with an exciting array of webinars, virtual galleries, short films and downloadable audio tours giving you a new window onto Glasgow's heritage.

Bookings for our live webinars will open on Tuesday 1st September.

Unlocking Glasgow’s buildings… digitally

Starting from Monday 14th September, you’ll be granted special access to Glasgow’s stunning architecture right here on our website. 

Take a virtual walk through our city’s landmarks in our video tours, Q&As, and online galleries, perhaps peeking into the backstage area of Barrowland Ballroom in a series of photographs, or taking a trip up the iconic Finnieston Crane in a short film commissioned for the festival.

Some of our buildings will be featured in live video tours on Facebook, while others will have a live Q&A session in Zoom. The events held in Zoom are marked as webinars in our brochure, and you can reserve your spot in them from 10am on Tuesday 1st September.

Unveiling histories

The theme for this year’s festival is Untold Stories, so we’ll be spending the week investigating some of Glasgow's more marginalised histories and lesser known tales. 

We’ll learn about the secret Soviet map of Glasgow, part of a massive covert operation undertaken by the USSR during the Cold War. We’ll contribute stories to the Queer Distance project, which is collecting memories of places across the city from the LGBTQ+ community. And in a talk led by the University of Glasgow, we’ll continue the vital conversations we began having over the summer about how we can appropriately remember our colonial past without appearing to celebrate it. 

There’s lots on offer encouraging us to take an alternative view of Glasgow’s buildings and to dig deeper into our heritage. Read our full live events programme here. 

The city in cinema

On top of the collection of short films that we’ve commissioned exploring places like the City Chambers or the Finnieston Crane, the Glasgow Short Film Festival will present a selection of short films - both Scottish and international - that reflect on urban environments: how do we live within our cities and how do they affect us? How are they designed, who benefits, and who is excluded? 

These films will be available online for 48 hours from their premiere on Wednesday 16th September. More details on how to watch will follow.

Get outside

Guided walks have become a mainstay at our festivals over the years, and 2020 will be no different. 

Use the app GuidiGO to download one of our audio tours to take with you on a walk - or a cycle - around the city.  You’ll find guided tours exploring places like Glasgow’s vibrant mural trail, the historic Glasgow Cross, or some of the contemporary art strewn across the city.

Download GuidiGO from the Apple Store or Google Play.
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Enter our photography competition

Architecture and our built environment help structure and give form to our sense of place. It is the buildings which populate our streets that anchor and store many of our experiences and stories for later, waiting to be rediscovered or found.
In our photography competition, we invite you to share your encounters with sense of place. Your image should show the building or space in its wider context or environment, capturing not only its physicality but also the feelings or emotions you feel when you interact with or see this site. Through examination of your everyday environment and Glasgow through your eyes, we hope to see untold stories.
Your Brief                    
  • Select a building on a one of your favourite Glasgow streets
  • Capture the building’s purpose and how it anchors or holds the street together
  • You can focus on a specific detail or element of the building or approach it as a whole
  • Can be a new or old building - think about how you can convey the building’s history
  • In your caption use up to 50 words to tell a us why this building adds to your sense of place in the city.
    
Photographs can be submitted via email with the hashtag #GDODFUntold in the subject line doorsopendays@gbpt.org
                                
You can also send your submissions on social media - Upload your picture on instagram, tag @glasgowdoorsopendaysfestival and use the hashtag #GDODFUntold. Please include the location of your building in your submission caption.
                                
Prize sponsored by Gulabi, Glasgow’s independent film developing and scanning lab based in the South Side. 
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Where to find us online

Use these links below to access our digital offerings:

Website: https://www.glasgowdoorsopendays.org.uk/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/glasgowDoorsOpenDays
Instagram: @glasgowdoorsopendaysfestival
​YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCa7X-eaS75XtOB25w1DhgoQ
Twitter: @GlasgowDOD

We look forward to you joining us online next month to celebrate Glasgow’s fascinating architecture and heritage. We hope that you will take the advantage this year to virtually explore parts of the city, visit buildings and hear from people that you might not have been aware of, or likely to stumble upon as part of your usual physical festival. 

Win a trip to the top of Finnieston Crane

31/7/2020

 
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Have you ever wondered what the view is like from the top of Finnieston Crane?
 

Now's your chance to find out! We're giving one lucky person the chance to climb to the top of the Cran and star in a short film, where we'll explore the landmark's historical relationship with Glasgow and what its future might look like. 

​We're planning to release the film online this September as part of our newly digitised Glasgow Doors Open Day Festival. 

The Finnieston Crane is a symbolic reminder of our city's industrial past, first casting its reflection in the River Clyde in 1932 and going on to play a heavy role in transporting locomotives built in Glasgow to the rest of the world. It is estimated that 25% of the world's locomotives at one point were built by the St Rollox works in the north of Glasgow, which sent their exports by train to the Crane on the Clyde.

How do I enter the competition?

Send us a short video telling us why you want to go up the Finnieston Crane - we want to know what it means to you! 

Videos should be no more than 30 seconds, and send to us on Twitter or Instagram. Make sure you tag our profile to get seen (@GlasgowDOD on Twitter or @glasgowdoorsopendaysfestival on Instagram). The deadline to apply is Friday 7 August.

We're especially keen to hear from people with a personal connection to the Crane, such as a family member having worked there. This is not essential though.

Practical details

- Applicants must be 18 years or over.
- You must be available on Monday 17 August for filming, and one day the week prior for prep.
- You'll be accompanied up the Crane by a local historian and a representative from Big Cran Co, who have just taken over management of the landmark.
- The journey up the Crane will be supported by a H&S professional.
- Unfortunately the Crane is not accessible at this stage, so the volunteer must be physically able to climb the stairs and not be afraid of heights.

Creative Planning Day 2020

23/1/2020

 
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Image courtesy of The Village Story Telling Center
​Are you planning on participating in Glasgow Doors Open Days Festival in September 2020? Come along to Civic House on Tuesday 18th of February to meet the festival coordinator and other participants to discuss your event!

The festival coordinator will be leading a discussion on effective event planning and unveiling the 2020 festival themes. Whether you are planning to open a building, lead a walk or have an idea for an event, the workshops will help you refine your plans with opportunities to ask questions and discuss with seasoned Glasgow Doors Open Days Festival participants. Submissions will be opening soon after the creative planning workshop so this is a great way to make sure you make your application is the best it can be.

Places for this workshop are limited so make sure you sign up in advance and please let us know if you can no longer make it.

We look forward to meeting you and sharing our plans for Glasgow Doors Open Days Festival 2020!

CLICK HERE TO SIGN UP

2019 Photo-diary highlights

19/11/2019

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Photography by Tommy Ga-Ken Wan and Andrew Low
Glasgow Autonomous Space
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Glasgow  Gurdwara Guru Granth Sahib Sikh Sabha
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Festival Hub @ The Garment Factory
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Glasgow Film Theater
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Collective Endeavors @ The Glasgow Art Club
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Graham Campbell leading Abolition Walk
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30th Anniversary Mural by Cobolt Collective @ GTW Storage with Brass, Aye!
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Civic Reception at Glasgow City Chambers
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Booking not required...

28/8/2019

 
There are a massive 95 buildings open to the public during festival week. 33 of these venues offer building tours which do not require pre-booking! 
View the full list of tours available on the day...
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A Tour With a View...

10/8/2019

 
Looking for the perfect rooftop experience this GDODF? Here’s a selection of some of the buildings and tours that offer outstanding views, from terrace bars to the top of a 22-storey tower block. Ideal for capturing some stunning landscape shots. Read more...
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Image: Cooper Cromar

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Access Guide now available

10/8/2019

 
We've compiled a list of all the fully accessible buildings, walks and events for wheelchair users and those with reduced mobility. Click here to view the guide.
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Image: Neil Thomas Douglas

Programme Live!

2/8/2019

 
Our full 2019 programme is now available! Download a PDF of the brochure or, if you'd prefer, browse individual listings. Bookings open at 10am on 1st September!
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Brochure news...

31/7/2019

 
They're here! We've listened to your feedback and you can now order your copy of the 2019 brochure to be sent directly to your door! 
​For those of you able to make it along ​to a Glasgow Library, get checking your local as they are starting to make their appearance across the city...
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Aged 18-25? love Doors Open Days? Get paid to join our Young Advisory Panel...

29/1/2019

 
We've teamed up with the Scottish Civic Trust with support from Big Lottery Fund and are on the hunt for new members from 6 areas of Scotland (including Glasgow!) to join our Doors Open Days Young Advisory Panel (YAP). 
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Image: @ameliaclaudia

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G31 1JF
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