Midsteeple Quarter Announce Winners of the Shop Front Design Competition
Midsteeple Quarter Executive Director, Scott Mackay, awarding the £200 prize to winner Alana Nosratzadeh from St Joseph’s.
Friday 14th May, 2021
Midsteeple Quarter are pleased to announce the winners of our recent Shop Front Design Competition, which asked High School Pupils from Dumfries & Galloway to submit their ideas for what the new shop front of ‘The Oven’ could look like.
Midsteeple Quarter invited the students to join in their shared vision of Dumfries Town Centre, asking them to submit ideas and suggestions for the new shop front that could represent the historic character of Dumfries, provide a new way to interact with the public post-Covid or a completely new vision to show what the next generation of the town want to see.
Midsteeple Quarter aims to help shape a new future for Dumfries Town Centre; one that responds to the needs of the community and is run for their benefit. Midsteeple Quarters are now the owners of 5 buildings on Dumfries High Street including the former Baker’s Oven building (135-139 High Street), now known as ‘The Oven’, and have developed a design for a new building on the site comprising flats, a creative workshop space and a co-working business incubation hub. Planning Permission has been granted and the redevelopment of the Oven began at the start of March.
Dumfries has a proud history of beautiful shopfronts in the past which were individual and expressive of the businesses they serve, in recent years much of that character has been lost. Having recently purchased four more High Street buildings and with the redevelopment work of The Oven well underway, we wanted to know what the young people of Dumfries thought the shop fronts of the future could look like.
The judging panel was made up four judges – Gordon Fleming (ARPL Architects), Dion Corbett (MSQ Board Member and architect), Peter Kormylo (Chair of MSQ Board and former head teacher), Scott Mackay (MSQ Executive Director) and Gwilym Gibbons (Chief Executive of the Crichton Trust).
The winner from Dumfries Academy is Skye Allen, the winner from St Joseph’s is Samya Ishmail and the overall winner is Alana Nosratzadeh from St Joseph’s. Each winner will receive a cash prize of £100, and the overall winner will be awarded a £200 cash prize. Submissions will be available to view in a digital exhibition on the Midsteeple Quarter website coming soon.
Skye Allan from Dumfries Academy was a runner-up and was awarded £100 for her submission.
Samya Ishmael from St Joseph’s was also a runner-up and was awarded £100.
“We wanted to say a huge thanks to everyone who entered the shopfront design competition – all the submissions were really fantastic and everyone on the panel enjoyed looking at all the great ideas and suggestions. We are delighted to announced Alana as the overall winner of the competition – there was a lot of work put into her design, it was well presented and everyone on the judging panel enjoyed her ideas.”
Have a look at Alana’s winning design below in more detail & read more about the ideas behind her design.
Alana Nosratzadeh from St Joseph’s with her winning design.
“For my design, I tried to go for a classic yet modern look to represent the community evolving in Dumfries. The shop front would be a dark red so that it is not too contrasting, but can still look bold, and the front would have a vintage-style font. The front sign will be built out to create a small awning and on top I would like to put flowers there, for a bit of colour and fun, and so that it could become a miniature community garden where people could take care of the plants. The awning will also make room underneath for lights. The caged light bulbs match the aesthetic of the shop front and will also illuminate the building the it begins to get darker at night, so that people will still be able to look in and see inside.
By the window, there will be a shelf-like plank of wood so that there will be space for display pieces and underneath there will be a wooden platform. Behind that there will be tartan curtains, to include a Scottish theme, and also so that they can be closed if privacy is needed.
The glass front windows and the new design would allow the passers-by to take a glimpse of what is inside and will welcome them to be involved. At the bottom of the glass there will be a quote from the town council stuck on the front using vinyl stickers saying: ‘Proud of our history past, excited for our future.’ I liked this quote as it could encourage our community to come together and help build a brighter future for the town centre of Dumfries.”