Between two windows at Mackintosh’s Church at Queen’s Cross stands a single flying buttress. It is the only such feature on the street-facing side of the building, as the windows on either side of it are the only two windows that are inset deeply into the wall. Like the rest of the exterior, the buttress is made of red sandstone, and like the rest of the exterior it has a peculiar, almost cartoonish quality. Not only does it look vaguely zoomorphic- the pillar at the end of the buttress could be a bird’s face on a totem pole- but it also resembles a children’s slide: the highest part of the pillar juts out, and the smooth stone of the buttress seems carved away from it in one flowing movement.
A flying buttress helps support the walls of a church, especially in places where recessed windows weaken the structure. A gothic cathedral would have had hundreds of such features ranged around the entire building but Mackintosh included just one- suggesting, perhaps, that it is more of a playful addition than an architectural necessity. He built his church along classic lines: there is a tower, the windows look respectably gothic, and the larger windows run above the smaller, as in traditional cathedrals. Yet Mackintosh has fun with the classic formula, making the tower squat, the curves rounded, the detail minimal, and the buttress solitary. Instead of building a grand cathedral, terrifying and austere, Mackintosh creates a church that feels intimate, reassuring, and playful, like a cartoon in a child’s storybook.
