Hugenot House & Goldsmith House

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    • #707645
      Anonymous
      Inactive

      Does anyone by any chance have digital (or hard copies) of photos of Hugenot House or Goldsmith House before their facades were altered? Or alternatively does anyone know who designed them in their present forms?

      Goldsmith Link

      Hugenot House Link

      Thanks.

      Phil

    • #750850
      Devin
      Participant

      I have a picture of Goldsmith House from a few years ago – I’ll root it out for you and post it tomorrow (I kind of liked its pre-cast concrete panels!)

      There’s a picture a Hugenot House with its curtain walling in F McD’s The Destruction of Dublin

    • #750851
      Anonymous
      Inactive

      Thanks for that Devin.

      Phil

    • #750852
      Anonymous
      Participant

      Phil,

      There are prints of both for sale in the Dublin Civic Trust on Castle Street,

      I have little problem with Hugenot House as I didn’t like what was there and what replaced it has aged very well, as for Goldsmith House the opposite couldn’t more of the case, did the owners never here of sand blasting?

    • #750853
      Anonymous
      Inactive

      Thanks Thomond Park.

      It is interesting that both you and Devin prefered Goldsmith House with its old facade.

    • #750854
      Devin
      Participant

      Goldsmith House before replacement
      The lighting in this photo is quite flat so the facade looks a bit dull & lifeless, but I thought the panels looked good when they caught raking sunlight. And the whole thing was pebble-dashed & looked slightly honey-coloured in certain lights. I find the new yoke quite samey-noughties.

      Ground floor view (& girl eating sweets).

    • #750855
      Anonymous
      Inactive

      You must have gone back to take the top photo hoping to meet the girl with the sweets! 🙂

      Cheers for that Devin. I think it had a certain rythm to it. It will be interesting to see how the new version ages. I think they made alot of interior alterations to it. It certainly looks taller now.

      Thanks again.

      Phil

    • #750856
      Devin
      Participant

      something like that!

    • #750857
      Paul Clerkin
      Keymaster

      The real travesty is the horrific building next door on Tara Street…..

    • #750858
      GrahamH
      Participant

      Wow – I don’t remember that building at all! Very interesting detailing – really like the curved corner and the ground floor elevation that make it look not quite real – find of floats on it. The repeating windows are great – saying that such a feature can look terrible too in the case of ‘Oisin House’ aross the road.
      The new Goldsmith is currently featuring in the Erin Hotcup ad – ‘whatever happened to the land we grew up in – we lead such hectic Celtic Tiger lives etc’. Just about sums up the building 🙂

      Here’s a half pic of Hugenot House – only took it though for the new Stephen’s Green lanterns – look quite nice 🙂
      The new look H house is holding up well.

    • #750859
      Devin
      Participant

      Hugenot House’s new copper roof added 4 or 5 years ago increased its power a lot. The original granite refacing was from I gather 1990 direction (can anyone verify this?).

    • #750860
      Paul Clerkin
      Keymaster

      i think that the copper roof and refacing were of the sme time

    • #750861
      Paul Clerkin
      Keymaster

      @Devin wrote:

      There’s a picture a Hugenot House with its curtain walling in F McD’s The Destruction of Dublin

      This is it….

      and now…

    • #750862
      GrahamH
      Participant

      It’s a clone of the ex-Dept of Justice – really was horrendous.

    • #750863
      Anonymous
      Inactive

      Thanks for the images Paul. On a side note, it is interesting how much less clutter there is in the older image than the new one.

    • #750864
      urbanisto
      Participant

      Is there? I dont see this at all. The same lampstandards in both. More street signage in the first, bike stands etc. The only extras in the second (and its hard to see anything) are bollards and the Arches sculptor on the traffic island.

      I think the renovated version works much better then its replacement. I hate this 60s curtain wall effect of steel, glass and panels. Its so uninteresting.

      Whatever happened to the OPW plans to renovate/rebuild the block on the otherside of the cemetery?

    • #750865
      Anonymous
      Inactive

      @StephenC wrote:

      Is there? I dont see this at all. The same lampstandards in both. More street signage in the first, bike stands etc. The only extras in the second (and its hard to see anything) are bollards and the Arches sculptor on the traffic island.

      I think the renovated version works much better then its replacement. I hate this 60s curtain wall effect of steel, glass and panels. Its so uninteresting.

      The arches, the bollards and the CCTV camera pole are probably what made me think that. I suppose the time the photo was taken, the slight variation in angle, along with the fact that the older one is in black and white would add to this.

      The problem that I would have with the newer version of the building is the lack of continuity between the pillars holding up the arches and the rest of the vertical elements of the facade. I am also not a major fan of the way the larger windows suddently change their size and shape halfway up.

      It looks like the curtain wall is still lurking behind there somewhere being exposed every so often!

    • #750866
      GrahamH
      Participant

      Agreed about the arches – a more linear link with the upper floors would have worked better.

      Passed this building the other day on Adelaide Road – I think a good example of how a decent older building can be quite successfully reinvented. It is quite similar to Goldsmith House on a few levels (not that that building should have recieved this treatment). Sorry for failing light – again…

    • #750867
      Paul Clerkin
      Keymaster

      That was actually two separate building built around 15 years apart. Adapted by BKD and finished in 1998.

    • #750868
      GrahamH
      Participant

      Really – works well well all the same 🙂
      Seems they consumed most of the road here – more swanky glass crops up further down too behind a couple of Victorians.

    • #750869
      Anonymous
      Inactive

      In general, do people think that the replacement of facades on modernist buildings is more to do with new environmental technology or the image that the building gives off?

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