“Clyde Connect: A Cultural Catalyst for Glasgow’s Riverside” envisions a Cultural Interpretation Center that reactivates the River Clyde waterfront and reconnects it with Glasgow’s urban core. Once the backbone of the city’s industrial prosperity, the Clyde has become fragmented and underused following post-industrial decline, creating challenges of safety, accessibility, and identity. This project addresses these issues by reframing the riverside as an inclusive civic space where culture, history, and community converge.

The design proposes spatial interventions such as enhanced streetscapes, transitional zones, and porous urban edges, that strengthen visual and physical connectivity between city and river. A vertical programmatic layering strategy accommodates performance halls, exhibition spaces, workshops, and cafés within a compact footprint, linked by a circulation spine that ensures fluid movement. The ground plane extends as a landscape threshold, encouraging openness and interaction while dissolving boundaries between built form and public realm.

Drawing inspiration from global precedents, the project explores how architecture can embody cultural integration, perceived safety, and sustainability while honouring contextual identity. More than a building, the center serves as a cultural anchor and social platform, revitalising the Clyde’s edge as a place of gathering, learning, and interpretation. It aspires to transform Glasgow’s waterfront into a vibrant, connected, and resilient urban destination.