Look out for a grand, stone building with a dramatic domed corner tower and rows of tall windows stretching along the street - The Academy Shopping Centre will be right in front of you at the corner of Belmont Street and Schoolhill.
Alright, adventurer, you’re standing outside a place that’s been bustling with stories for more than a century! Imagine it’s 1905: the stone walls are echoing with the chatter and footsteps of a thousand schoolchildren filing into the Central Senior Secondary School - the place to be if you were aged 12 to 15 in Aberdeen. Back then, the building was considered so important, they had John Alexander Ogg Allan, Aberdeen’s official school architect, design it in a Renaissance style. Look at those powerful lines and that tower - it’s what one might call “imperial vigour,” just a teensy bit dramatic! In 1954, things got even more exclusive: only pupils who conquered the mighty 11-plus exam could make it in, and it became Aberdeen Academy. But, as all childhoods do, its days as a school ended in 1969, and the pupils marched off to Hazlehead Academy. Fast forward to 1998 - this Victorian school traded in pencils and books for shopping bags and lattes! Now, the central courtyard bursts with energy - think fashion shows, comedy acts, sizzling food wafting through al fresco diners. It’s a place where you can almost hear the laughter of students past, mingling with today’s lively crowd.
