Dublin skyline
- This topic has 644 replies, 86 voices, and was last updated 16 years ago by
.
- Posts
i checked out http://www.castleforbessquare.com to see if there is a 14 storey building going up on that site. it doesn’t have as many floors as that. it seems to have only 10 including the ground floor.
@alpha wrote:
i checked out http://www.castleforbessquare.com to see if there is a 14 storey building going up on that site. it doesn’t have as many floors as that. it seems to have only 10 including the ground floor.
MORE GENERIC YAWN…….
i don’t think much of castleforbes myself. it’s not terribly exciting.
No, it’s not.
But are we surprised really?
In all honestly like?Can’t wait for the day I log on here and actually go “WOW” at a new project…pleh. 😡
i myself am not surprised along with several others i would imagine. there is far too much of the same stuff out there already. there is one almost identical on the southside. i don’t know the name of it though.
visited castleforbes myself over the weekend … the design of the internal spaces was horiffic, never mind the exterior. The top of its midget 8 story ‘tower’ did however offer a good view of the docklands area, particularly the south quays …
it really is a wasted opportunity, dreadful stuff – the whole south quay is filled at this stage (i was quite surprised things were that advanced) nothing even remotely interesting. Its clear architectural quality is not even a consideration of the DDDA, whether its five stories or more, they just don’t give a shite – surely there was scope to do something even semi-interesting along the liffey.
Go down yourselves and have a look at ‘Castleforbes’, or even more depressing, the view from its top floor.
Who are the DDDA fooling ….this looks so modest, so dismal! The 1980’s Canary Wharf leaves it in the shade.
No mention of the ‘architects’ at all on their site.
Take a look at the floor plans – note the almost bedroom sized ‘store rooms’ in some cases – the internal layout really is dreadful.
Most balconies seem to be there purely to facilitate suicide, consisting of just 2 – 3 6″ decking boards, thats right, just 18″ in total.
i wonder do people write to/email the ddda and outline their concerns?
I just passed the new blocks on the north side of Pearse St running up to the canal dock and they’re horrible – particularly the balconies. A monotonous mass of lowish rise shite which reinforce the unappealing nature of that end of Pearse St (with the notable exception of Pearse Square). Given the great breadth of the Street there, the proximity to wide expanses of water, the existing tall buildings near by, this would have been a great place for taller and more distinctive SERIES of buildings. Instead we have the entire strech from Macken St to the basin lined with industrial looking 5 story crap.
A common criticism of high rise on this site is that some of the tall buildings being proposed are just “one story repeated 20 times”. There seems to be less ire directed towards developments which involve repeating the same pattern horizontally. I think the latter is much worse as it consumes far more of the finite resource, land. A building with an excessive footprint takes up land denying the opportunity for other buildings to be built.
Also I sustain no hope whatsoever that in twenty years time that these buildings will be replaced. It will be impossible given that the apartments will be individually owned by different people. On the other hand, I understand that TCD have plans to do something with the nasty redbrick innovation centre or whatever it is across the street. In this regard, the likes of Apollo house, Hawkins House or the ILAC centre represent far smaller threats to the quality of the built environment in Dublin. Yet people concerned with the built environment in Dublin seem to spend far more time anguishing over Hawkins House – a mistake which can (and will) be relatively easily corrected. A shitty block of apartments will be with us for ever and deserved far more critical attention, in my opinion.
jimg wrote:A common criticism of high rise on this site is that some of the tall buildings being proposed are just “one story repeated 20 times”. There seems to be less ire directed towards developments which involve repeating the same pattern horizontally. I think the latter is much worse as it consumes far more of the finite resource, land. A building with an excessive footprint takes up land denying the opportunity for other buildings to be built.
QUOTE]I love it! The beauty of this retort lies in its utter obviousness.
I think one of the reasons people find the docklands uninspiring is that it looks like docklands regeneration anywhere … homogeneity … one city’s docks regeneration looks like the next’s … and if this is the case, could it have been any different?
A really good landmark building is sorely needed in the area (and the U2 tower is definitely not it), one that would be popular with families, tourists and all walks … like the Graz Art Museum or the Birmingham Bullring featured earlier in the thread, but obviously on a scale appropriate to the docklands.
[align=center:zgkgd7ir]~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~[/align:zgkgd7ir]
On a related note can I make suggestion for this thread? – that people try to post pictures of what they are talking about. It would really help. Rather than just saying ‘this is shit’ & ‘that is shit’ we would all be able to analyise/criticise the relevant aspects of the docks development. There is a dearth of pictures on this thread for such a visually emotive topic.
jimg, where are the ‘5 story’ buildings in the area you talk about? – I haven’t seen any 5 story buildings there – all of the new stuff I have seen around the Grand Canal inner dock (between Pearse Street and the Liffey) is at 8-10 stories.
They are fronting onto Pearse Street itself past Macken Street. They may be 6 stories to be honest, I’m not sure. It’d be nice to attach photo’s but I just saw them from a taxi and I don’t have a digital camera anyway. It’s the balconies which I found particularly jarring. If it wasn’t so cold, I’d consider cycling down that way this evening to give myself a chance to develop a proper sense of indignation and dismissiveness.
I like the pictures that do be posted on this site. It is nice to see what people are talking about.
I think jimg is referring to “Gallery Quay”
With any composition, there is a balance between uniformity while avoiding tedium and contrast without creating a mess.
At one end of the spectrum is Dublin Airport, with disconnected buildings seemingly scattered at random across the site. The other extreme is somewhere like Darndale whose fundamental repeating unit is a very plain uninspiring house. These untis were then laid out in perpendicular geometric patterns like a circuit board. (image attached below)
This development doesn’t look so bad to me and is much better than the IDA young offenders prison across the road.
I would have to go down there and have a look again, but I would venture that for the sections of the Grand Canal Dock developments that interface with Pearse Street, it is perhaps best to avoid a sudden jump in scale, but go higher behind that. However, if the buildings are of a strongly horizontal emphasis, that is wrong. They should be broken up to respond to the fine grain of the city.
I might go down there and take some pictures if I get a chance at the weekend, so people can praise / lambaste as necessary.
Ok, a few pictures of stuff around the South Docks. Maybe we can get a decent discussion going on the Docklands and stave off the high-rise geeks with their Verucha-like cries of ‘DADDY, I WANT A HIGHRISE AND I WANT IT NOW!’ ( 🙂 )
This development on the north edge of the outer Grand Canal basin will actually be a jammy place to live – away from any noisy roads and with a south-facing aspect looking over the water and to the mountains beyond.
Don’t these apartments use some kind of newly-developed glassed-in balconies? It seems like something that should have been taken up before in our climate.
Fine, but will it all make a successful ‘place’ in the end?
Gallery Quay as you approach from Pearse Street, with Pearse Square in the foreground. No sense of progression from the urban grain of Pearse Street – just a sudden monolithic block. It could and should have been broken up and varied.
The public spaces around the outer basin are well-finished … but no people yet …
The north edge of the south docks.
The simple beauty of a canal-side warehouse.
Docklands regeneration – at times you could be in Belfast….or Cardiff…
QUESTION : –
Does anyone think that these ultra modern buildings are a bit “same same but different” to copy a phrase. There doesnt look like a whole pile of new thinking went into half of them and none of them have dublin characteritics.
ultra modern buildings ? steady on there …
- You must be logged in to reply to this topic.
