Dublin skyline

[kaz]

Hi, I'm researching a project on the changing skyline of Dublin and comparing it to changes made to other cities. I'd be really interested in your views on the matter, any buildings you particularly like / disllike etc. Also, I'm just new to living in Dublin, so please give me details of any particular architectural deligths I should go see! thanks.

[phil]

Hi kaz,

What sort of time-scale are you looking at (ie: Dublin since 1800 or just late 20th century etc?) and what Cities are you comparing it to? Also, are you looking at possible future developments, or is it just an examination of how it actually looks now? Sounds interesting anyway.

[alpha]

what skyline? lol. we need a good few high rise buildings to give dublin city a proper skyline. when i say high rise i mean 30-40 storeys. for example the eire tower. anyway to answer your question kaz... i quite like one georges quay plaza. i dislike millennium tower.

[samhraid]

Watch the birdies. Duck for cranes.

[PVC King]

You could also include the Shay Cleary 'Santry Cross' scheme that I think is about 16-17 Storeys. Sadly most tall proposals in Ireland have been kicked to touch by Board Planala for example Spencer Dock, the modernised Georges Quay by american crowd and Smithfield complete with the big glass viking boat.

Also the Omuire Smyth scheme for the docks that got dropped after it was given planning.

Pretty depressing really

[kaz]

Looking at what it actually is like, and prob jst late C20th changes; time is short!

[CLAIRE MURRAY]

hey kaz, im in the same boat as you as i am doing my dissertation on skyscrapers, and a shorter version concentration on dublin. the problem with dublin is it doesnt have a skyline to be proud of. may i suggest you take a walk along the river liffy down towards the docklands. and even get in touch with the dublin docklands authority as they want a limit of five to six story buildings which face directley onto the liffy.

[CM00]

Personally, I find that quite reasonable, If a large amount of High RIse buildings were aloud alongside the Liffey, they would only serve to separate the quays and campshires from the rest of the City. Such a state of affairs would limit the growth of the Docklands as a living city quarter, rather than a showpiece of architecture. The current approach of allowing a few landmark buildings is recommended.

[MARIA CAGNEY]

II'm currently doing my thesis on Imperial monuments in Belfast and Dublin, looking specifcally at how the Spire has replaced Nelson's pillar. When DublinCorporation relaunched the competion, the pillar project ,one of the top requirements for entries was that they had to have a strong vertical axis. This is because Dublin Corp. are attempting to piece a skyline skyline together for us!!

[Morlan]

Here's one I took a few weeks ago. Stitched them together quickly for the thread.

Dublin's skyline.

[Morlan]

I've been looking at some of Dan Heller's skyline pictures. They're quite impressive compared to my dismal picture.

[jimg]

Anyone recognise that building in the bottom right of the last of Dan Heller's photos? The photo only includes a bit of it. I think that photo was taken from the Sky bar or whatever it is bar at the top of the Guiness museum. I was up there with a few friends about five years ago and one of them pointed out that building as a "disgrace" (being modern) while I thought it was quite nice. Maybe the one in the photo is not the building we were arguing about. I don't have the architectural language to describe it but I'd have guessed it was built in the 50's or 60's in a "modern" style - maybe 3 stories?

[GrahamH]

Looks interesting alright - is it an office or residential, or something else?

Where was your picture taken from Morlan? I'm guessing the Stephen's Green Centre mutli-storey....
Other nice pics there too - we've seen the original and best here before from the Gasometer thread

Interesting to note how the view has changed, not least with the addition of that heap of junk in the middle...

[PVC King]

It is part of the Digital Hub site and is an office block. You will be happy to hear that it will be retained although its interior will be upgraded, it is early 1970's or late 1960's if memory serves.

[Andrew Duffy]

Here's the city centre from the Storehouse:

[Morlan]

That's much better

[garethace]

I once, remember a story of a boy who grew up with one of the finest stretches of Trout Fishing River, in all of Great Britain, at the end of his back garden,... who later in life, having not expressed any interest in fishing whatsoever, at any stage,... developed a very keen interest in Train Spotting. So I guess, it shows how little your upbringing, surroundings and background sometimes have to do with how you grow up and develop. Yeah, I reckon, there is someone for just about every hobby under the sun,... and I think this website here, proves that point, yet again.

http://users.breathe.com/yorick/potspot/rules.htm

BTW, I notice every one of the above posts/skyline pictures has focussed on the macro scale, whereas, the scale that people are most likely to experience, in the scale described by the skill of the 'Pot-Spotter'. I mean, the Chimney Pot is more a development of the Classical Orders,... if you were to look at Le Corbusier's Ver Une Architecture,... he does a quite nice study of the Parthenon, and goes into much detail of how the Parthenon is still one of the most beautiful buildings on the planet. I mean, even if it is things like cantilevered lamp posts, and street lights nowadays, it is still about skylines. One of the Architects, who deserve the utmost credit in recent times, for repairing, or 'adding' to urban skylines, have been Coop Himmelblau.

http://www.coop-himmelblau.at/index_frames.htm

They have managed to build in some of the oldest and most conservation oriented urban centres in Europe and the world, and most of their architecture speaks about this notion of the urban skyline. Carme Pinos spoke widely about the urban skyline, in relation to her tall buildings, during her recent lecture here in Dublin this year, at the AAI. I think she has got something to say about that,... as does the architecture of Enric Miralles, who has done a lot for streets in Spain and elsewhere, through his spatial constructions, all of which deal with the notion of silouhette and meeting with the sky also. The Architects who deal with the opposite to skyline, are Architects like Thom Mayne of Morphosis, and when you put Coop Himmelblau and Thom Mayne together, as they did, to do a project for Los Angeles, in an urban park, to build a Concert Hall, sunken into the ground,... you got a building which dealt with the earth, and being 'in' the ground, which also having a building, that was exurberant and danced ontop of the ground, playing with the light and the sky and the ambiance,... that was Coop's contribution to that project. If you look at any Morphosis books, you will see the project I am talking about. Niemeyer, is an Architect who I think has done quite interesting things for the skyline too, in his own South American native part of the world. Even an Architect such as Mies van der Rohe should not be left out, given the contribution he made to cities in North America, surely a Mies building is a lot to do with the skyline, the sense of place, of a city like New York or Chicago.

Architects like Kahn, and even James Stirling tend to be good at working on the ground, as part of the ground and in the ground, giving their buildings that sense of rootedness, in the place, the earth itself,... which is a feeling that I really am drawn to. Though on the other hand, Coop Himmelblau's stuff has done so much for old cities too, creating what they describe as 'cats walking on the roof',.... you get the feeling that if the cat jumped, the whole roof top installation, would respond by quivering, and shaking in response. I was drawn by these nightime, urban, skyline kinds of Architects for a while. I think looking at the recent works of Zaha Hadid is worth while, who is influenced by Mies and Niemeyer. Or even looking at the contributions by people like Piano and Grimshaw, urban projects, or even Santiago Calatrava. Who have all introduced dynamic and spectacular forms in the urban fabric. Gehry, Koolhaas and Libeskind most certainly. . . Depends on how much you want to get into it, but certainly many, many architects have responded to this aspect of cities and architecture,... as much as they have to the more ground level stuff, the boardwalks, the pavements, the streets,... it is good to work the two together, to think of the two together I feel. Getting back to the more ordinary level stuff though, even in suburbia, there seems to be a lot of stuff, on roofs, and people interested in roofs, on the web,... but any of the above mentioned famous architects, would bring you close to an understanding, of skylines, and the contribution of buildings and new architecture in that respect,... certainly Coop Himmelblau, should be a port of call for you. The images I attached are typical of Blau, and what they aspire to achieve I think. More banal but,...

http://www.roofersreview.com/gallery2/main.php/v/Oneofakind/

Can you imagine how important a 'landmark' this building's roof would be for a cold, grey, car-dominated suburban kind of city in the US.... I mean, the Future Systems stuff, or the Libeskind stuff is trying to make a bigger statement, because the site demands it, or the building type demands it, or the City's major demands a bigger statement, or whatever, but the same effect, should also work in Suburbia, albeit on a smaller level. It is something that has yet to be fully exploited in Dublin's suburbs,.. In the suburbs, even small landmarks can become 'big' landmarks over time. Venturi's book Learning from Las Vegas would be worth a look at too. Fine collection of roof top objects here,...

http://www.roofersreview.com/gallery2/main.php/v/copperbydesign/

what this does highlight, just like Le Corbusier's description of the Parthenon, is the scale at which you need to increase things, to actually make an impact, when 'to be viewed' on top of a building,... you really do have to supersize things, or they get lost,... that added considerable cost too, when you are talking about materials which are durable like copper especially, which is I presume, why one sees fewer rooftop objects anymore,.. that is why I suggest Coop Himmelblau,... they manage to divert money back into building budgets for skyline aspects of the architectural impact, statement and design. Mies really was the Daddy though, he could manage to divert all efforts in a building design,... to just making some of the most beautiful silouhettes and exterior skins, ever since the Parthenon.

Enjoy,
Brian O' Hanlon.

[garethace]

I said I would attach a couple of more, to save you digging through their site,... but what always appealed to me about Blau, was they didn't skirt around the issue of designing for a skyline,... they tackle the issue head on, and sometimes, when that is demanded of a site/brief,... Coop Himmelblau just product the goods better than anyone.

Brian O' Hanlon.

[GrahamH]

Thanks for those Brian - some very striking images.

Also for the chimney pot website - that has to be the most extraordinary site I've yet come across!
Notably the concept of Caminotherapy, it apparently being "the use of chimney pot spotting to demonstrate that an individual has scope to make life meaningful in his or her own terms."

As bizarre as it may sound - it is nonetheless interesting if you have a read. At least Freud has been kept out of it, given the topic...

[garethace]

I am only speculating here, but I suggest the predominance in other posters' images of 'global perspectives' of the Dublin city skyline, has got something to do with people not wanting to express an individual opinion, of what the Dublin city skyline is, or is not, or could be. That is quite problematic, when dealing with environments, if people are taught somehow, not to put mass in their own personal interpretation of their immediate conditions, but instead are forced to stay out there in some safe zone,... where you merely look at the global perspective, rather than risk embarassment from looking any closer than that. The Pot Spotters I think are people who like to view things that pertain to their own lives,... people who have their eyes open.

The quoted piece below is written by John Allen Paulos, and tells you something about games, in which people vote on what they think the group would like. Eventually, if you play this game for long enough, things reach what is termed the 'Nash state of Equilibrium'. That is, when individuals modify their actions until they can no longer benefit from changing them given what the others' actions are. I think the above series of posts on the skyline, represent quite a difficult problem in terms of the planning of our cities and built environments,... the planning game plays itself again, and again, and again.

Eventually it reachs a point at which it can't budge anymore, and that situation is usually the 'safe zone' of perception of what is a skyline, imagined in so many of the previous posts. I would have been much, much happier if people had posted one or two shots of Chimney Pots,... at least then it would ensure to me that people were actively aware of the skyline conditions that pertain to their own lives, in an everyday context. The fact that noone showed a picture of their favourite chimney pot, and instead chose to highlight the global panoramic view of Dublin's skyline, suggests people here, don't feel too engaged with a skyline, at the 'everyday' scale. Noone on this message board, wakes up in the morning and sees the broad panormaic images of Dublin shown in the posts on this thread - Noone.

The Coop Himmelblau architecture can indeed by very useful in a lot of cases in old European urban cores, where the 'Nash state' of things, comes to weigh much too heavily upon decisions regarding skyline and aesthetic expression. The Coop Himmelblau work, focussed peoples' attention back on the everyday, the skyline that was a part of their own lives - the kind of descriptions of skylines, that remain in novels and paintings years and years after they might have vanished.

John Maynard Keynes, arguably the greatest economist of the twentieth century, likened the position of short-term investors in a stock market to that of readers in a newspaper beauty contest (popular in his day). The ostensible task of the readers is to pick the five prettiest out of, say, one hundred contestants, but their real job is more complicated. The reason is that the newspaper rewards them with small prizes only if they pick the five contestants who receive the most votes from readers. That is, they must pick the contestants that they think are most likely to be picked by the other readers, and the other readers must do the same. They're not to become enamored of any of the contestants or otherwise give undue weight to their own taste. Rather they must, in Keynes' words, anticipate "what average opinion expects the average opinion to be" (or worse, anticipate what the average opinion expects the average opinion expects the average opinion to be).

What I am saying really, is that most of the images presented above, try to anticipate what the average opinion expects the average opinion expects the average opinion to be. :-)

Brian O' Hanlon.

[alpha]

does anyone know when construction on the heuston gate building is due to start? that building was approved months ago.

[Rory W]

does anyone know when construction on the heuston gate building is due to start? that building was approved months ago.

The whole site has just gone up for sale by tender so it'll be a while before anything is built there. Good to see the state (and eircom boo) actually getting the planning done prior to selling to a developer at least the state is then maximising the value of the land for a change

[d_d_dallas]

The approved scheme, and what is currently up for sale is not the "tall building" phase of the development. That part is on land owned exclusively by the state and is currently with ABP. I imagine subject to a separate sale due to it's different ownership and planning status.

[jimg]

Anyone watch the program about tall buildings on BBC1 last night? There was a strong focus on London which isn't too surprising but what struck me is how we seem to be about 20 years behind London in terms of thinking about the issues surrounding tall buildings. It seems current fashion is that we should have "landmark" tall buildings dotted seemingly at random around the city - at least this is the impression I get. This is a model of development that London has belatedly realised causes damage to existing historic skyline. I've always felt we should concentrate ALL tall buildings in one part of Dublin, protecting existing skyline as well as ensuring that any individual tall building only becomes a "landmark" if it deserves it architecturally and not simply because it dwarfs all surrounding buildings.

Anyway, what most impressed me was Renzo Piano's "Shard of Glass" which absolutely amazing. I really hope that this gets built. The depressing aspect of this is how, despite our new-found prosperity, new buildings in Dublin and Ireland in general contrast poorly in terms of boldness and design with what they are building and considering in London.

[GregF]

Yep.......saw that programme too. It all seems to be happening in London and Britain in general. Even their provencial cities are getting stylish makeovers. ie Gatehead Newcastle, Birmingham, etc.....Thought the same as well that we are lagging way, way behind here in Ireland in shaping the look of our towns and cities for the future. In all fairness London is emerging as the great European city with stylish new 21st landmark trappings too. Illustrious native architects such as Norman Foster, Richard Rogers etc.....leading the way. London has it all; despite the Nazi air raids which obiterated some parts of the city and most of Wren's Cathedrals, it still has a plethora of old stock buildings and famous landmarks unique to London. Added to this today, the Gherkin, the Lord Mayor's Office, The Eye, etc. etc...and with the new Wembley Stadium due for completion next year we are left here in Ireland truely in the shade. All we are getting with our building boom are houses and standard appartment blocks. Dublin as capital city should be leading the way for the rest of the country. New emerging Dublin is kinda basic in essence. The promise of a twisted tower in Dublin and a Leibeskind art centre or whatever, we really dont have much to look forward to. Sure is it any wonder that Cork, Galway, Limerick etc... won't be any better as they normally follow and don't lead. We really and truely lack ''style'' when it comes to architecture!

Check out next Wednesdays programme on BBC1 ''A Short History of Skyscrapers'' ....Its gonna deal with the new buildings of Asia.

(Last Wednesday's programme aptly ending with the eerie tune of Roxy Music's ''In each Home a Heartache'' with Brian Eno on the keyboards)