What happened
For years the front of the Old College Bar carried the date 1515 and a plaque claiming it as Glasgow's oldest public house, which suited a small, plain room on the High Street a few doors from where the old university stood. Those who have worked through the licensing records are more cautious: Old Glasgow Pubs gives the building as put up in 1810 and first licensed in 1812, and reports at the time of its demolition described it as understood to date from about 1815. Either way it was among the older bars in the city, and it kept a following well beyond its own street. Fire tore through 223 to 229 High Street on 4 May 2021, and the damage was bad enough that the council took the buildings down in the interest of public safety; the bar came down on 16 June 2021. CAMRA, which had last surveyed it in December 2020, closed its record that October and marked the site vacant.
What is there now
A cleared plot on the corner of High Street and George Street. Plans for purpose-built student accommodation — 261 studios and 176 en-suite rooms over ground-floor commercial space — were submitted for the site in May 2025, and describe the ground as vacant since the 2021 fire. Nothing of the bar survives above the pavement.
Sources
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