In 1996 Charles Rennie
Mackintosh's House for an Art
Lover was completed from
original drawings of 1901 and
now serves as contemporary
centre of excellence for the visual
arts.
In 1982 the park was the venue
for the visit of his Holiness Pope
John Paul II which attracted
280,000 people and part of the ceremonial platform still remains.
His Holiness Pope Benedict XVI visited England and Scotland on a four-day
State Visit from 16-19 September 2010. The Holy Father arrived in Scotland
on Thursday the 16th where he was received at the Palace of Holyrood
House by Her Majesty the Queen. Later that evening Pope Benedict
celebrated a public Mass at Bellahouston Park with Archbishop Mario Conte
in front of 65,000 pilgrims.
The Scottish composer James MacMillan was commissioned to write a new
Mass for the visit (the Blessed John Newman Mass) and over 700 singers
were in the choir. The mass was celebrated on a magnificent purpose-built
stage at Bellahouston and the Glasgow ceremony was televised worldwide
to an audience estimated at over one billion people. A Papal Memorial
Garden was built in 2011 to commemorate this event.
There are several points of horticultural interest such as the walled garden
with its fine collection of ferns and daffodils collected by the 19th century
plant collector Peter Bar who lived locally. It also boasts a wide variety of
herbaceous perennials, wall-trained shrubs, Chrysanthemums, Dahlias, and
annual borders.
The House for the Art lover also has a less formal garden consisting of
mixed shrubs and herbaceous borders with a collection of heathers and
heaths. The flanks of the central Ibroxhill is clothed in Rhododendrons and
under planted with a vivid display of spring daffodils.
It affords views over much of the city and as far as Ben Lomond on a clear
day. Also located here is a granite stone unveiled by King George VI on 9th
July 1937 which marked the site of the Empire Exhibition of 1938 and was
subsequently relocated to where it stands today.
Find out more about the features in the park in the Bellahouston Park
heritage trail and the surrounding history from the Glasgow City Council
website.
Morag
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