1927 – Gresham Hotel, O’Connell Street, Dublin

Rebuilt (1925-27) after the ravages of the Civil War, the Gresham Hotel is a Dublin landmark which originally opened in 1832. It was designed by Robert Atkinson (1883-1952), an English architect who was Director of the London Bartlett School of Architecture. Inline with many of the later buildings on this stretch of O’Connell Street, it has quite a restrained almost austere façade. The ornament has almost been completely removed leaving a stripped Classical style. This style was quite popular in Dublin, especially on O’Connell Street when it was being rebuilt after the twin destructions of the Easter 1916 Rising and the Irish Civil War.

Atkinson had some of his renderings and drawings for the building published in Academy Architecture and Architectural Review 1928: Vol 60.

Described in The Builder, September 16 1927 as “The Gresham Hotel was one of the many buildings which were destroyed during the disturbances of 1919. Mr. Robert Atkinson, F.R.I.B.A., was entrusted with the charge of preparing plans for the new building, which is part of the scheme for the rebuilding of O’Connell-street approach by the Institute of Architects of Ireland. The hotel facade is designed on the lines of the late eighteenth-century Dublin building tradition, and this fagade in Portland stone is very dignified, as our illustrations show. The hotel’s site 1s about 180 ft. deep by 120 ft. wide, and. the ground floor comprises a large winter garden round which are grouped the large restaurant, a smaller restaurant, the ballrooms (not yet built) various retiring rooms and cloakrooms, and, of course, the main entrance hall. There is provision for about 120 bedrooms, a proportion of which have bathrooms en suite, the basement contains yet more public rooms including a grillroom and smoking-room. The decorations of all the public rooms and bedrooms have been carried out in tasteful style, and the introduction of fine wrought iron work —- both for the chandelier and various hanging and wall lamps and for the fine marquise to O’Connell-street — furthers the atmosphere of taste that runs through the whole building. The kitchen is fitted on most modern lines, including a refrigerating plant. The heating throughout the hotel is on the panel system, whereby the walls are heated, and no pipes, radiators, or grilles show. For the convenience of guests, a garage has been built at the back of the hotel.”