The Tolbooth has acted, for many years, as the best place in the centre of Stirling for concerts, dramas and even a few exhibitions, some of which I have been lucky enough to witness. But as the building grew older and was used more and more it became out-of-date and drab in the technology factor, even if it did keep its atmosphere. So in 1999 Stirling council decided to renovate the old town courts to a brand new state of the art public building with everything that Stirling didn't have and needed with recording studios, meeting space, a large new auditorium and more all to be ready for Autumn 2001. The town was excited and looked forward to an amazing opening party with new exhibitions and music etc. but whilst all this is being expected building work was delayed and the Tolbooth wouldn't be ready until March the following year (2002) six months late. Once again the council had messed things up and the Cowane Centre just down the road kept its job of being the temporary Tolbooth hosting all the concerts and performances designated for the Tolbooth.
March has come along quickly and the Tolbooth is already prepared for the opening night and even though I'm quite a critic of everything the Council does, I do think that they have improved the place.
They have added an extra four floors (from four to eight), a lift, a large new lobby, a café and a bar and a number of new rooms including the 200 capacity theatre. They have moved the main entrance over to the side of the building, and added a fantastic large glass door which has Tolbooth frosted on it, a small shop (which won't sell much, only CDs of the concerts) and some big new toilets.
A downside of the whole building is the number of stairs that have been put in, some with more purpose than others, but if you don't fancy wandering around these forever then there is an alternative, the new metal and glass lift that has been put in looks nice and not tucked in to a dark corner. It stands near the middle of the interior with fairly easy access but it is not for someone who is scared of heights. You can't look at any part of the lift that has not got a big panel of glass or a thick sheet of metal with holes you can look through . So, if you don't fancy the lift there's the stairs again, on the landings of the stairs there are small sign-posts like the ones in the town itself, it is best to follow them instead of almost getting lost like yours truly.
The next thing I would like to mention is the auditorium. Once a very small theatre now a large and state of the art performing space ideal for “Conferences, Drama and live music” with enough space to accommodate 200 people seated with a stage of 12 metres by 4.5 and 200 standing with a stage of 12 by 9 metres.
Aside from the building's appearance, I would like to mention that every year there is series of concerts in Stirling called Le Weekend. Le Weekend was originally held in the Tolbooth before 1999 and during its restoration was held at the Cowane Centre, two established venues which have always had a good atmosphere. Will the new Tolbooth have the same feeling of ambience? New buildings may lose that sense of character for many reasons: the building may have new staff, people new to the annual events that have happened in the past, it won't look the same, one explanation is that when buildings are renovated they are almost always enlarged and thus a sense of emptiness will occur. Thankfully the Tolbooth seems to have kept the regular employees, making the guests feel at home. But does size matter? The number of new rooms introduced in the Tolbooth is amazing, but at least half of these will not be needed all the time. Only time will tell us how well the Tolbooth will cope with events.
From what I can remember the old Tolbooth had poor parking facilities, something which should now be sorted out thanks to a deal with the nearby Stirling Old Town Jail who will let the Tolbooth use their extensive parking facilities.
Two other additions to the new 'Booth is the café and bar. The café is placed right next to the old front entrance where the lobby used to be. Thanks to its position, right next door to the theatre itself, you can wait in the café until the show is about to start. The bar is further away and pretty hard to find at first.
Perhaps my favourite section of the whole building is the 8th floor. It may only have one large room and the recording studios but it does have a nice wee balcony and the stairs leading down to the 7th level are impressive. When you walk down the typical dark metal stairs to the lower floors you walk next to an old part of the roof with the tiles still on in their original grubby state, it may not bring back any memories but certainly in my case it will act as a memory of times in the building later on.
When I was there the main section of the whole new area which needed finished off was Jail Wynd, the small road that connects St John Street with Broad Street. It is now most definitely the Tolbooth's own wee road hosting the new main entrance, with the noticeable glass door. If it's finished by the opening night then it should really add some colour to the whole street area.
That's all I have to say about the actual building itself but there are some other topics I haven’t covered such as community projects and how they will take place within the new building (if the groups involved want to use the Tolbooth). Perhaps some smaller organisations will not want to use such a large building for their drama production or get-togethers. For bigger groups such as companies wanting to do presentations the spot may be perfect with large rooms, a very big auditorium with a large audience capacity and located in the centre of the town.
But again smaller communities will possibly have a better use for the building, the theatre, for instance, which has more than double the Cowane Centre's and old Tolbooth's volume will raise a bigger revenue for the groups whist offering them a fair rate for rent.
Alban Dickson
March 2002