Cooper's Building, 499, 505 Great Western Road, Glasgow

Cooper's Building, located at 499-505 Great Western Road in Glasgow, is a Grade B listed commercial building designed by architect R Duncan in 1886. This flamboyant French Renaissance structure occupies a prominent corner site at the intersection of Great Western Road and Bank Street. It features three storeys and attics, with a tall slender tower at the corner.

The ground floor is clad in polished granite, while the upper floors are finished in ashlar. All openings on the upper floors are round-arched and can be bi- or tripartite. The ground floor includes a colonnade of Corinthian pilasters topped with ashlar capitals. At the corner, there is an arched doorpiece with columnar reveals and an incised archivolt, leading to a coffered ceiling. Above this, the first and second floors have bowed three-light windows that rise to the slender tower, with aedicular windows situated below the clock faces. The building is topped with a corbelled parapet featuring a cast-iron balustrade, and lucarnes project from the conical fishscale slate roof, which also includes a lantern.

The Great Western Road elevation has four bays, with first-floor windows that are deeply recessed and have paired columnar reveals. The second floor features bipartite arcaded windows, and giant orders are used to accentuate the first and flanking fourth bays. An off-centre feature includes a curved balustraded balcony at the second bay of the second floor, supported by bold pilasters flanking the window below. The Bank Street elevation consists of ten bays, with arched bipartite windows on the first floor and arcaded groups of three on the second floor. Sash windows with plate glass glazing are present, and giant orders define the terminal bays. There are band courses between the floors, an eaves cornice, and a deep plain parapet. A tall aedicular dormer and a steeply pitched French slate roof with cast-iron brattishing complete the structure. A very fine continuous cast-iron balcony on the first floor is supported by decorative cast-iron brackets.

Inside, the building has undergone significant alterations, but some ground floor decoration remains. This includes cast-iron columns with decorative capitals, a rich coffered plaster ceiling, and a good tessellated floor.