SEC Centre

Main Building

The Main Building was completed and opened in 1985, with a concert by the Royal Scottish National Orchestra in Hall 1. It later held the Grand International Show in Hall 4 as part of the 1988 Glasgow Garden Festival. In 1990, the SECC was one of the hubs of Glasgow's year as European City of Culture, hosting concerts by Luciano Pavarotti, the Bolshoi Ballet and Opera and Bryan Adams.

Upon its opening, the Centre quickly gained its nickname from the local press and thus to general usage, "The Big Red Shed", owing to its outward appearance, which resembled a giant red painted warehouse. The nickname became redundant after the Main Building was painted grey in 1997.

The SECC occupies 64 acres (260,000 m²) of land – most of which is surface car parking space – and hosts numerous music concerts, exhibitions and professional conferences. The SECC also has its own railway station, Exhibition Centre, on the Argyle Line of Glasgow's suburban railway network. The 16-storey Forum Hotel (now part of the Crowne Plaza chain) was opened on the site in 1989. In September 1996, a new 5,095 m² exhibition hall, Hall 3, was opened. In May 1997, the conversion of Hall 1 into the Loch Suite conference venue was completed.

SEC Armadillo

The Clyde Auditorium with the main SECC building behind it

In 1995, construction began on a new building – the SEC Armadillo – to become part of the SECC complex. Designed by award-winning architect Sir Norman Foster and often called "the armadillo" by Glaswegians, this new 3,000 capacity building was completed in 1997.

Queens Dock 2 expansion

In April 2004, the owners SEC Ltd again commissioned Foster and Partners to design a £562 million regeneration of the Queen's Dock area, under the name QD2 – so called as this is the second regeneration of the former Queen's Dock area since the centre's inception.

This project incorporated SSE Hydro, a 12,500 seat, £50 million concert arena for the SECC, which opened in September 2013. The centre is also to be served by the Clyde FastLink. The surface carparks to the West of the site will be sold for residential development and land to the east has also been identified for commercial development.

Shows and Events

The venue hosted the Eurovision Dance Contest 2008.

The SECC hosted the Girls' Day Out Show in 2009, 2010 and 2012.^[4] It staged The Scottish Golf Show in 2009 and 2010.^[5]

The venue annually stages the popular BBC Good Food Show.^[6]

On 15 November 2016, it played host to Insane Championship Wrestling's biggest show of the year, Fear & Loathing VIII, the company's biggest sold out show to date. It also was the biggest selling show in British wrestling history since Big Daddy fought Giant Haystacks at Wembley Arena in 1981.^[7]

The SECC hosted the World Science Fiction convention twice, as Intersection, the 53rd World Science Fiction convention in 1995, and Interaction, the 63rd World Science Fiction Convention in 2005 (including the SEC Armadillo).

Irish pop band Westlife were honored at this venue with four specially commissioned bar stools which will be a permanent fixture at the venue. This marks an amazing 49 performances at SECC where they entertained over 380,000 fans over the years selling more tickets than any other act.^[8]