A concert venue which incorporates Aberdeen's principal war memorial, Cowdray Hall lies next to Aberdeen Art Gallery, with which it is connected internally, on the corner of Schoolhill and Blackfriars Street in central Aberdeen. Designed by architect A. Marshall Mackenzie (1847 - 1933), the building is a fine Neo-Classical granite structure with a low copper dome and was opened by King George V and Queen Mary on 25th September 1925. The hall and organ were the gift of Weetman Pearson, 1st Viscount Cowdray (1856 - 1927) and Lady Cowdray.
The city's war memorial is in two parts; inside, between the hall and the art gallery, is an austere War Memorial Hall, with books of remembrance, while outside a quadrant colonnade on the corner of the building is dedicated to the memory of those who died in both World Wars. It contains a finely sculpted lion, in grey Kemnay granite, which was designed by William MacMillan (1887 - 1927) and executed by Arthur Taylor.
