Isi Metzstein

Isi Israel Metzstein OBE (7 July 1928 – 10 January 2012) was a German-born architect who worked at Gillespie, Kidd & Coia and taught at the Glasgow School of Art.

[1] He became known for his postwar architectural designs working in the European modernist style of Le Corbusier and the American Frank Lloyd Wright.

Whilst at the Glasgow School of Art, Metzstein met Andy MacMillan and the two became friends, often going for drinks together in the Kings Arms on Elmbank Street.

An early project for St Paul’s Church in Glenrothes (1957) is a modest building of simple form and materials, yet exhibits an extraordinary quality of light and monumental presence which owed much to Le Corbusier.

Combining functional requirements with resonant symbolism, they were the perfect vehicle for developing an architectural philosophy, which reached its most mature expression in the design for St Peter’s Seminary at Cardross.