Decentralisation and the Customs House
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Thanks for that.
Maybe the building’s too big for such use, there’s literally acres of office space including the basement.
Whereas the corridors and open spaces are very fine, as far as I know the offices themselves are of the suspended ceiling variety.
Nonetheless they are high – but it would still require a lot of money and effort to convert the whole building successfully. Hopefully the current Visitors Centre in the 18th century part will act as an encouraging precedent.Its such a shame that the fire destroyed almost all the building, including the beautiful Long Room – what a fantastic place it could be today – a museum in itself.
John Beresford’s private apartments to the left-rear of the building at time of completion in the 1790s were described as ‘vieing with oriental magnificence – the palaces of Kings and Princes’. And in 1789, 50 mahogany doors at a whopping 6 guineas each were ordered for the apartments.
What a loss.So here is another variation on this theme, why not move the parish records and geneological service from kildare street and use it as a superior information centre with library services like computers, newpaper reading rooms and so on, a museum of the customs house itself, a tourist information centre and on top of this, an access point for the family history services and a centre for local history research, maybe with some rooms given over to the free university.
sorry, i meant custom house, graham, i never took you for a pedent.
I agree and I think that Tourism Ireland should get the space that would not be suitable for civic use.
Where better to market Ireland in Ireland?
Special Use premium value is a live issue here,
Strangely, this is the closest dedicated thread there is to the Custom House…
Anyway, just reading a brief interview with Christine Casey, author of ‘Dublin’, part of the ‘Buildings of Ireland’ series just published, she highlights apparently for the first time that the rebuilding of the drum of the Custom House in Ardbraccan limestone rather than Portland stone was as much down to political pressure as it was financial!
Pressure was brought to bear in ensuring that a ‘native’ stone would be used in the rebuilding, especially in light of the significant quantities of Portland that had already been imported for other parts of the project.
She notes that the reconstruction budget had already significantly overun by the time the application for funds for the drum rebuilding was made, so it was inevitable that an Irish stone would be used at that stage.In the book she comes across as slightly vague as to precisely which was the dominant catalyst: the money or the politics, but in the interview she says: “…there was much debate in the D
@mturley wrote:
My colleague Deputy Eoin Ryan is wondering what should happen to the Customs House now that the Department of the Environment is moving to Wexford. Seeing as the Customs House is such a architecturally important monument perhaps it should host a permanent exposition of Dublin architecture (good and bad) and lost (i.e. destroyed) architecture of Dublin. If you have any ideas why not get in contact or post a comment and I will pursue these with Eoin.
http://www.michaelturley.com/home/?postid=20
[email=michael@michaelturley.com:2poxc57b]Michael Turley[/email:2poxc57b]My suggestions are as follows
1) Knock the building down thus freeing up much needed space on which to build cheap housing
2) Turn it into luxury appartments
3) Knock it down and build the conference centre in it’s place. The vast amount of space it occupies could accomodate a sizeble indoor arena – I reckon the area freed up could accomodate a 10,000 seater arena
4) Turn it into a theme park. I imaging this would be a first internationally? A massive theme park in the centre of a major city. What a boast!!Graham, isn’t that the way things are in Ireland. We can never do things properly.
I don’t suppose refurbishing it to its Gandonian original would be on the cards…alas.
In my opinion, it’d be a better location for the National Library than the cramped one they’re using at the minute..but they won’t move.
Personally, I think the building is too grand in appearance and in pedigree to be used as a tourist office. An architectural museum would be a fine thing for it.
And given the size of the place, there would surely be space for a museum on the Irish diaspora too.On a related matter, will the Loop Line ever come down?
There were plans in recent years to rebuild it, to make it more transparent.Graham, isn’t that the way things are in Ireland. We can never do things properly.
I don’t suppose refurbishing it to its Gandonian original would be on the cards…alas.
In my opinion, it’d be a better location for the National Library than the cramped one they’re using at the minute..but they won’t move.
Personally, I think the building is too grand in appearance and in pedigree to be used as a tourist office. An architectural museum would be a fine thing for it.
And given the size of the place, there would surely be space for a museum on the Irish diaspora too.On a related matter, will the Loop Line ever come down?
There were plans in recent years to rebuild it, to make it more transparent.@Graham Hickey wrote:
Anyway, just reading a brief interview with Christine Casey, author of ‘Dublin’, part of the ‘Buildings of Ireland’ series just published, she highlights apparently for the first time that the rebuilding of the drum of the Custom House in Ardbraccan limestone rather than Portland stone was as much down to political pressure as it was financial!
Where did you see the interview? She also said as much in an interview with Ryan Tubridy on the radio a few days ago. (I’d usually prefer to cut off my foot than listen to him, but CC was my thesis supervisor a few years ago so I made an exception. Her reaction to his stated love of Farmleigh was priceless- a model of diplomacy that didn’t quite hide her shock. He sounded awfully wounded too and made noises about how great the gardens were, what a great place it is for kids, etc.)
She’s the biz, and I’m delighted to see the book has finally appeared. It was in the pipeline since the late 1990s. Pity that it’s only Dublin within the canals though- it was originally meant to take in the whole city (and maybe county too?).
@Graham Hickey wrote:
Unusually shaped book too….
The reason is that it derives from Pevsner’s Buildings of England series, which was designed to fit into the glove compartment of a car for those sunday drives.:) Very much meant as a manageable field guide, and organised accordingly.
Thought as much – it’s similar to a 9 inch brick 🙂
Yes a wonderful book, packed to the rafters with information, as its Pevner colleagues are.
Heheh – most people’s reactions to Farmleigh are on exactly the same lines, “but, but but why – it’s Victorian isn’t it?”
The interview was only a brief piece, in the local paper of her home town 😉“…her home town…”?? Someone else’s (home?) town too, methinks.
I think Santa might be putting one in my stocking this year- it will be a busy christmas around Dublin if so. I have a vision of archiseekers bumping into each other in the snow as we tramp our way around the back lanes of town (but avoiding each others’ gazes, obviously:) ).
Interesting that Farmleigh and the Custom House be mentioned in the same thread. As I wondering if any one new why the idea of using a type of Portland cement made of crushed Portland stone could not be used on the existing drumof the Custom House in the same way that Farmleigh is rendered. It is rather a quick fix and perhaps it would clash with genuinne Portland stone. Its just that the 1991 conservation work was an ideal time to carry out such work. Can anyone shed any light on the idea?
Yes. I’d be very interested to hear too. The Abraccan stonework is nonsensically out of place.
If the building is to be abandoned by the Dept, would it be possible to open up the whole of th esouth front’s arcades. At the moment the building is like a mute, sitting there with no contact with the outside world.
True, and this would be nice, but unfortunately the place’d be destroyed. That’s the very reason the arcading is railed off and the doors sealed, though the doors may well even be dummies at this stage – surprising really they weren’t punched through for windows in the 20s reconstruction….
And even as it is, the exposed parts of the ground floor suffers from the odd bit of vandalism.
But certainly you’d wonder alright about plastering over the limestone with a Portland-based mortar, similar to what is apparently being done on the National Museum and Library as mentioned before. There they are using a mortar with a certain amount of ground sandstone in it to maintain the colour and texture of the existing Mountcharles sandstone dressings. It’s taking forever to do though, they’ve been at it for years…
Haven’t they?! I was up there last week and I couldn’t believe how long it’s taking, must be four years now?
But the results are breathtaking, aren’t they?
And I would wonder, while I take your points about vandalism, that if the building was used for a purpose that would give put it in demand for a large portion of the day, if the arcades etc would get that much done to them by ne’er-do-wells.
Bank of Ireland is a good example of such a building, and there’s nothing saying they couldn’t just close the arcades at night, like the College Green forecourt.
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