Alexander Thomson monument
marking the grave of our architectural hero
It was an incredible honour, to win the international competition to design a monument for Alexander ‘Greek’ Thomson. Erected on his unmarked grave in the Southern Necropolis,
Glasgow, the polished black granite structure memorialises Glasgows other great architect.
The ‘difficult passage’ represented by the cleft of the monument opens not towards the
‘phenomenal’ world and material plane but towards a different ontological realm. The journey
implicit in the steps between the cleft suggests the transition from one mode of being to
another.
Of the three slabs that rise from the unified base, the axially positioned inscription
stone assumes dominance. Traditionally the inscription stone has been seen as providing rest
for the otherwise wandering souls of the dead.