Glasgow wants to save the Art Nouveau Mackintosh School destroyed by fire

The Glasgow School of Art was engulfed in flames for unknown reasons on Friday evening, and more than a hundred firefighters battled the blaze throughout the night and day. The fire damaged all floors of the building, and some experts spoke of its irretrievable destruction and the necessity for demolition.

"We certainly do not want to write off Mackintosh’s building just yet," said the chairperson of the Glasgow City Council, Susan Aitken, today according to the BBC.

According to building expert Tom Inns, drones have examined the building's rubble and found that the basic structure remained largely undamaged. "This building is definitely not without a chance of being saved. In some form, it will be rescued," said Inns.

Probably the architecturally most significant building in Glasgow was constructed at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries according to plans by the Art Nouveau artist and architect Charles Rennie Mackintosh. The fire had already damaged it in 2014, and this weekend's fire occurred during an ongoing renovation that cost several tens of millions of pounds (hundreds of millions of CZK). The school, which boasts several graduates who are holders of the prestigious Turner Prize, was set to reopen next year.