Kirsty Wark guide in Glasgow – “My big old town”

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When I was a girl, Glasgow felt like a mystical and strange place, with incredibly large buildings, wrapped in the soot of the big industrial city. You could feel the foundries and factories, and people crowded in the streets, many of them who smoke, my father among them, a lawyer traveling to and from the city by train. We lived 20 miles in the southwest in Kilmarnock, where Massey Ferguson tractors were built, the famous Johnnie Walker distilled and the first edition of Robert Burns Poetry published. But the trip to Glasgow was exciting.

Often, I stayed with my grandmother. As a treat, we went to the cinema of cartoons from Renfield Street, take tea in the afternoon on Byres Road or visions the Kelvingrove Art Gallery. I remember walking with it along the long balcony overlooking the central room, and in the end being face to face with Dalí Christ of St Jean de la Croix. Painting terrified me – I was not over eight years old. It is a place that I always like to visit.

As a student, I found my love of architecture walking in the city, looking up towards buildings that took Italian, French, Dutch and Egyptian architecture and made it all Glasgow. At each corner, you can look at a building with an elegant detail; A window with a stained glass ship, a roller carved in the sandstone, a glorious gargoyle or a iron forged in the foundries of the city. The story tells that New York planners were inspired by Glasgow, and the resemblance is still there.

I buy the “ lasagnes of yesterday 'of Eusebi after a long day

Glasgow has always been elegant. I just made a documentary in two parts in Scottish fashion and our starting point was 1955, the year of my birth, when Christian Dior organized his first spring / summer fashion show in the city. Another recent combination of Scotland and France is Fetiche. The founders April Crichton and Orély Forestier met while working at Sonia Rykiel in Paris and created a fun clothing brand in collaboration with local and French manufacturers. I often visit their workshop in an old Gorbals school, on the south shore of the Clyde river.

I like to stop outside the Timorous beasties – the windows are a riot; Surrealist montages of psychedelic fabrics crawling with dazzling insects, a grip on the side of Jouy canvas. Kate Bush is a big fan. Further on in the West End, I reach the University's coffee, perhaps the most liked ice fair in the city, and one of the many strange Italian establishments here. It has belonged to the Verrecchia family for four generations. I love thinking about my parents who went there in the 1940s when they ran or, as my mother said, unfortunately, “make a line”. Eusebi is another favorite stop. I buy his famous “lasagna of yesterday” after a long day.

In the 1970s, radical demolitions threatened the city. Now we reinvent the spaces. With the family, we go to Cottiers, a theater, a restaurant and a bar in a former Victorian church named after the artist Daniel Cottier, who designed the stained glass and frescoes. We always have the impression that he lives in the building. As often as a drink turns into a meal – the French onion soup should not be missed.

One of the best things about life in a big city in the old town is the treasures found at auction, and Great Western Auctions is one of my regular haunts. I love the pursuit of a beautiful China and the craic is great. On our walls are paintings by Scottish artists that I have successfully submitted, even a couple of minor colorists. Do not jump for charity stores in the West End, where I am looking for my crystal glasses and the very important Bowl Perfect Trible.

Er return from the auction, it is worth stopping in Ga Ga on Dumbarton Road. This South Asian establishment is by Malaysian-Scottish chief Julie Lin-try the sea bream with coconut butter on chilli or sichuan and garlic. A night glass on the way back is omnipresent, a Glasgow institution. The walls are decorated by the deceased and gray of Alasdair and, installed in them, I have a malt – maybe a Highland park or an arran – before bed.

Kirsty Wark is presenter of the first row of the BBC Radio 4 and the host of Reunion. On May 11, she will be honored with a BAFTA scholarship at 2025 BAFTA TELEVISION AWARDS