1984 – Calvert House, Castle Place, Belfast

Architect: Kennedy Fitzgerald

calverthouse

Replaced Lanyon’s Ulster Club of 1863, ruining that part of the streetscape of Castle Place. A facade of tinted glass and polished stonework. Demolished. Winner of the RIAI Gold Medal for 1983-1985. Described by the RIAI as “Calvert House is an extremely successful exercise in infilling a modern office building between existing Victorian buildings in a Belfast street. It is an unusual pleasure to be able to consider a speculative office building for the RIAI Gold Medal, as this building type is notoriously bad at relating to its neighbours.

The building achieves beauty by using a bold combination of large industrialised curtain wall components in its central bay with the more neighbourly smaller scale of masonry in the recesses next to the Victorian buildings. Overall, the facade gives a sense of creativity and playfulness, which is a welcome contrast to the formal treatment of so many speculatively built office buildings.”

Photograph Albert Bridge / Calvert House, Belfast / CC BY-SA 2.0

Published July 28, 2024