Òran Mór: How Colin Beattie turned a vast leaky church into a hospitality honey pot

Across Glasgow, Victorian churches are now hotels, carpet warehouses and branches of Wetherspoons. But only the former Kelvinside Parish Church is mentioned to tourists on the open-topped bus.

By Anna Burnside

📷 Colin Beattie at the Òran Mór, by Robert Perry

Across Glasgow, Victorian churches are now hotels, carpet warehouses and branches of Wetherspoons. But only the former Kelvinside Parish Church is mentioned to tourists on the open-topped bus.

As they approach the top of Byres Road, the guide says: “There’s the Òran Mór there, home of the f…