Cathedrals of Commerce
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It occurs to me that the fabric of Dublin city was invaded back in the 1960s by the global trend toward a world economy, and the expansion of Dublin as a city of international commerce, and business centres. These often ugly looking houses of commerce were viewed with discust by many at the time, and it was felt that Dublin needed to preserve its heritage – not lean over to just accomodate more and more glass and concrete boxes.
Now compare that to today, where the notion of commerce and global economics has made Dublin a much more strategic place to both live and work from. We have embraced the whole notion of business and a new age of prosperity. New buildings are no longer viewed with discust as ugly houses of commerce, but are rather seen as signs of economic prosperity and development. What I would like to know, is how that change did come about. How to the people who remember the initial wave of palaces of commerce feel about things nowadays.
There is an important time element in this kind of discussion. Were the angry youngsters back in the sixties merely rebelling against something for the sake of it – were they really as concerned as they thought they were – about the historic architecture of Dublin? Has the attitude of the younger people changed nowadays, where they see BIG EURO signs on anything gaudy and large, made of glass and steel? I think that this debate could include a wide variety of points of view and could make an interesting contrast – houses of commerce, in the 1960s versus the present in Ireland’s cities.
Is there a strong architecture that can come from such a brief? Are some of the current attempts one sees around Ireland at the moment, just shallow attempts, which will age poorly? Have the large scale commercial structures dotted around the urban fabric contributed anything? It just strikes me in general that Dublin is very much driven in its development by commercial type of development – there is precious little mention about projects just for the city itself.
I also understand that the scale of this development is unprecedented for Dublin city’s history. The building in the 1960s wasn’t quite in the same league. I was just wondering if any people who lived through the last building effort would care to make any comments.
The reference to Cathedrals of Commerce first surfaced in Short’s Urban Reader in the early 1990’s. It referred to buildings that were built to a specification that glorified their creators, i.e. cost was secondary to the impression of the buildings.
It probably could have been written in 1929 with the building of both the Chrystler Building and Empire State in New York.
The closest proposal to this I have seen for Dublin was Dermot Desmond’s Eco-Sphere.
When is Dublin going to see a developer that is prepared to leave a genuine ‘Landmark’ Building?
Regardless of the short term costs. i.e. the sums done over 25+years vs 7-8 years?
Would I be very wrong in thinking, that during our first date with the destiny of globalisation – i.e. fabulous looking commercial palaces that could be anywhere in the world – that we did not find it so easy to swallow. Basically modern Architecture got a very bad rep.
But now we seem to have embraced this global architecture type of commercial style, rather like some old man clutching onto a blanket. I.e. The more cathedrals of commerce we can build, the less likely our prosperity is going to escape? I seems to be like a total U-turn to the 1960s reaction. Have we in fact changed that much in so short a space of time?
I mean, Archiseek board is one of the places that loves to just slate the ‘Irish-ness’ and sense of one’s own identity, which people held so dear in the 1960s. But have we lost a large portion of our identity, and need to joke about it now, just to make ourselves feel better about it? Obviously Spain cannot go back to the days of Columbus, but in its architecture, spaces and cities nowadays, you still do get some sense of history, or of place.
Not at all clutching a blanket,
More weighing up the architectural merits more. What gave commercial architecture a bad name was
Apollo House
O’Connell Bridge House
The IDA at Wilton Place
7-9 Sth Leinster St at a lower height
What might redeem it is a quality tall structure.
Georges Quay isn’t bad of it’s type but it is not a viable front runner such as an Eco-Spere or similar.
Something with a wow factor and more importantly a building a roof top restuarant so it can be accessed by the public
I would have thought that Dublin suffered very little (architecturally) from the commercial evolutions of the 60’s and 70’s.
Compared with cities of similar size in the UK or mainland Europe commercial developement in Dublin then was minimal.
Look at the roads network in Dublin even now,
anyone driving along the Rock road every morning into town still passes Count John MacCormack’s house more than 100 years later. Not that much has changed.Dublin is still a very intact Victorian city.
Comparison with the Continent and most of the UK is what makes the destruction of particular streetscapes all the more tragic.
As with the overseas locations it was easy to blame the Second World War for the destruction. Excluding Paris and Edinburgh few other cities in Europe were as unscathed
Here it was CJ & co destroying anything that might have had any connection with pre 1921 origin.
What replaced the older buildings is the real disgrace. What modern architecture needs in this city are a few Landmark buildings of real quality.
The only really decent modern office building I can think of is Hardwicke House on Upper Hatch St. But it is again quite a low building.
Georges Quay is more of a contribution to the problem than the solution. I hope that the U2 tower works as well in practice as on paper.
As a jounalist who covers the middle east and lives in Beirut said, I wake up every morning and say to myself, which way is the wind going to blow today. Read about the place here:
Both Beruit and Belfast have been quiet for a while now.
Once the Monte Carlo of the East Med it suffered a few bad years before being rebuilt. The process was overseen by a guy from Killiney.
A cathedral to peace but not yet a Cathedral of Commerce.
http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-caruso1jan01,1,1235954.story?coll=la-headlines-business
Outdoor shopping, with apartments overhead.
I have never even been to New York, but this thread I did find interesting;
Different kinds of cathedrals of commerce?
BTW, if you are on a 56k like me, it might take a bit for the images to load in.
Not really what the general definition of cathedral of commerce refers to I think it was meant more to describe Corporate office Headquarters such as the Chrystler building in New York or the Deutche Bank towers in Frankfurt.
Symbols of Corporations having reached giant proportiones or speculative developments providing office space for overseas firms in major corporate centres.
The photo of Time Square in New York is a tragedy I would commit suicide or at least emmigrate if Dublin suffered a similar vista. What makes it even more tragic the Quality of the tapered building in the background, which looks stunning in 1920’s B&W photo’s
What gave corporate architecture a bad name in the past here was the way the ‘Cathedrals of Commerce’ bombastically and wrongly intruded the old and historic parts of Dublin city……ie to mention the old regulars of the Bank on Baggot Street, the ESB on Fitzwilliam Street etc….etc…
Attitudes changed in the 80’s here I suppose with the arrival of Post Modernism and an emerging respect of our past architecture ie, The pedestrianisation of Grafton Street and the like…. etc.
But this anti 60’s ‘Cathedrals of Commerce’ hang up carries on today where new contemporary develpments face huge hurdles even on brownfield sites.I agree that bad commercial development was it’s own worst enemy in Dublin. There is still a major problem of perception with many commercial developments.
But with the possible exception of the Carrolls Building or the badly sited Banks Of Ireland (Central and BOI) were any office buildings developed as Cathedrals of Commerce?
Or were too many corners cut to trim construction budgets?
OT,
Another young generation will have something to aspire to Good web site about space travel etc – what a way to start 2004.
On Commerce,
Here is an article about problems facing California with large consumer boxes dotting the place all over USA. 230,000 square feet is around 16,000 sq metres roughly I think. Anyone got a conversion? In America, the problem isn’t so much to do with exploiting old historical areas, as Greg mentions, but in trying to make some order out of the low rise sprawl. One thing you can say about the Neon Chinesse city images, was how dense they actually are.
I am just wondering, does this thread stir up any thoughts about commercial building and geography, landscape, favourite places to live etc, etc, etc.
http://www.cyburbia.org/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=10089
Cardinal made some interesting observations about America geographically.
I agree Brian well designed ‘Cathedral of Commerce’ spec buildings are the best defence against clusters of groundscrapers.
Link:
Just another one on the general street lighting theme
With all this new technology of high-speed Internet and more advanced phone services, there has been a proliferation of bigger and more frequent switching pedestals, and this new Trafalgar Pole has eliminated that clutter from the subdivisions where it is being applied.
“I would love to see a refreshing change”
Quote of the Year
I will just link a couple of good images here;
http://www.totalwar.com/community/shogal/epkedit5.htm
Sort of the inspiration for something I am doing at the moment.
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