What can Glasgow learn from Mexico City about saving heritage buildings?
Opens Weds 11th February at GCHT, 54 Bell Street
Many of the beautiful Art Deco and Art Nouveau buildings in central Mexico City are at risk of being lost — affected by abandonment, earthquake damage, and a new wave of post-Covid redevelopment and “extranjero” digital nomad migration. While regeneration brings benefits, it also threatens the distinctive architectural character of whole neighbourhoods.
Yet across the city, architects and communities are resisting this erasure. Rather than pursuing costly, purist restoration, they are reactivating derelict buildings by working with what already exists — retaining ruin where meaningful, stripping back where necessary, and adapting spaces for contemporary use.
[un]Faithful Reinstatement explores these approaches and asks what they might offer Glasgow.
About the exhibition
[un]Faithful Reinstatement looks to reframe how we think about heritage building reuse in Scotland by comparing Glasgow with a city where heritage is equally layered and contested: Mexico City.
Focusing on former townhouses built during the Porfirio Díaz era, the exhibition presents case studies of successful reoccupation — spaces where decay, history and adaptation coexist. These projects often involve being deliberately unfaithful to the original architectural intention: reworking circulation, programme and atmosphere to support new uses, while preserving the building’s cultural value.
Through drawings, interviews and built examples, the exhibition examines:
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structural and material interventions
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interior finishes and spatial strategies
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business and occupation models
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navigation of listed-building systems and building regulations
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the philosophical implications of adaptive reuse
And what about Glasgow?
The exhibition poses a direct challenge to prevailing conservation approaches in the UK, where layers of regulation — designed to protect heritage — can instead discourage reuse and accelerate decline.
By contrast, Mexico City offers precedents for low-cost, culturally driven reactivation that strengthens neighbourhood identity and economic resilience — prompting fresh thinking about how buildings at risk in Glasgow might be given new life.
Funded by Glasgow City Heritage Trust and The Mackintosh Society, and curated by Julian Caldwell and Mukund Anand Worathur.
Free entry
Exhibition Opening Hours: 10am – 4pm
Every Wednesday to Friday, 11th – 27th February 2026
GCHT, 54 Bell Street, G1 1LQ