Glasgow’s OVO Hydro opened in September 2013, with the modern domed building having a capacity of over 14,000 people.
Despite the contemporary design, the Hydro bears an uncanny resemblance to plans for a concert hall done by Charles Rennie Mackintosh in 1898. The plans were submitted to a competition held to design a concert hall for the Glasgow International Exhibition of 1901, though were rejected due to an ‘engineering improbability’.
As part of the Mackintosh 150 events, marking the 150th anniversary of the birth of the Scottish artist, models of Mackintosh’s unbuilt structures were produced by modelmaker Brian Gallagher. The concert hall plans included twelve cast-iron trusses, with a roof span of about fifty-five metres - an extreme challenge for the early 1900s.
