pearse street developments
- This topic has 64 replies, 21 voices, and was last updated 15 years, 1 month ago by
.
- Posts
The lower level of the academy is a reconstruction with good salvaged materials as when I worked in the area it was fairly obvious that someone had driven a coach and four through the facade to provide plate glass windows.
That’s great ! but what about the extension to the trinity plaza hotel ? Was it a keep the facade and gut the rest job ?
@a boyle wrote:
That’s great ! but what about the extension to the trinity plaza hotel ? Was it a keep the facade and gut the rest job ?
I don’t think it is. I reckon by the looks of it they are being restored and integrated into the hotel. When the South Anne Street development was being prepared you could see the whole site empty behind the remaining facades (apart from the corner building, which was retained in its entirety). I don’t recall seeing these Pearse Street buildings being completely gutted at any stage.
The application numbers seem to be 3635/04 and 6060/04
I tried to link the second one of these here, but it was too long and wouldn’t work. It shoudl work if you put the above numbers into the planning search:
http://www.dublincity.ie/business_services/planning/planning_search/index.asp
it all look fine on the planning application. The returns have all been demolished (it doesn’t say how old or new they were) and the internal layout includes ‘minor’ changes. I would assume (hope) this mean breaking a door through here and there , but basically keeping the interior whole .
Perhaps there is someone who works nearby and has a better idea. They do look wonderfull from the outside though, so hopefully the interior is nice also.
@jimg wrote:
I found this old photograph of Pearse St. while dicking about on the web:
It took quite a while for me to find my bearings with the photo as the corner building mirrors Doyles Pub across the street which I found very disorienting. The giveaway is the firestation tower in the background behind the wierd christmas tree thing or whatever it is.Ok it’s a fairly trivial piece of knowledge but I found out what the “weird christmas tree thing” in the above photo is. It was called the Crampton Memorial and apparently Cosgrave’s Illustrated Dictionary of Dublin, has an entry:
The Cramption Memorial at the junction of College-strret with Gt Brunswick-street, was erected from the design of J. Kirk R H A. A paper of 1862 states: ‘The sculptor hopes it will be a monument to himself as well as to Sir P. Cramption’. It is generally called ‘The Water Babe’ but less flattering names have been applied. It consists of a stone base with three drinking fountains]
This fountain has been placed here,
A type of helath and usefulness,
by the friends and admirers,
Of Sir Philip Cramption, Bart.,
Surgeon-General to His Majesty’s Forces,
It but feebly represents
The sparkle of his genial fancy,
The depth of his calm sagacity,
The clearness of his spotless honour,
The flow of his boundless benevolence.
[/align]I’m not sure why but I find it amusing on a number of levels.
I typed the above from a book called The Annals of Dublin Fair City by E E O’Donnell published in time for the millenium (the 1988 one!). I’d love to know more about Cosgrave’s Illustrated Dictionary of Dublin. There’s also a reference to it in John Finerty’s 19th century coffeetable book – Ireland in Pictures. I couldn’t resist buying a copy of the latter even though it’s available in a digitised form on the web. But besides that neither google nor abebooks revealed anything above what sounds like a fascinating book.
According to a small footnote in Yvonne Whelan’s Reinventing Modern Dublin it was removed in 1959. The reasons given are its poor condition at the time.
What a shame. Though it is of a design that lends itself to quite rapid deterioration; I’d imagine many of the ‘lilies’ came loose over time, and got clogged with dirt and general litter. It’s such a bizarre monument, espcially with “a bust of Cramption nestle[ing] in its foliage” 🙂
And people though the Floozy was weird?!
I wonder where it is now – surely (hopefully) someone wanted it as a bit of salvage…
Nos. 133 & 134 Pearse Street, opposite the Holiday Inn.
What is the fate of these two buildings?! They seem to be vacant. Every time I go past them they get slightly worse.
It’s very rare to find smaller-scaled post-Georgian buildings in almost completely original condition like this – original brickwork & pointing, roofs, chimney stacks, cast iron downpipes, sash windows with some old glass, panelled doors, simple but gorgeous timber Doric-columned doorcases & spoked fanlight, front steps & railings, even lime-plastered rubble-stone walls in the basement – very rare.
These pictures were taken about a year & a half ago. They’ve got slightly worse since then. I really worry about them. They’re not listed.
how can they not be listed ! ?
the quaint little fan lights are lovely.Aren’t they just – most unusual. Apparently they date from 1848, which is just about possible. They look a bit earlier, but it’s probable an older design continued to be used in the by-then unfashionable city centre.
To shed a bit of light on the current state of these properties, they went up for auction way back in 2002 with guide prices nothing short of a song: No. 133 was offered for the grand total of €400,000, while No. 134 was put up for €450,000. The larger double-fronted property to the right was offered for a meagre €700,000.
The former pair in particular were in an appalling condition, hence the exceptionally low prices. Here you can see one of the stairwells, with ravishing 1960s wallpaper, hard-boarded balustrade, and salmon-painted lower walls.
© The Sunday TimesAnd sure what better way to bring a cable in than through a smashed window pane?
Most original features appear to have survived intact, if you wish to include Bakelite light switches and door knobs 🙂
At the time of their auction in 2002, the houses were offered for sale as separate entities, but it was thought likely that a developer would snap up all three given the attractive economies of restoring them as a group. I don’t know if this happened, or indeed if the houses sold at all. Presumably they did. Perhaps they were snapped up as a nice little speculative investment, with the intention of flogging them later on much-inflated? Goodness knows they’re worth a fortune now. Though I see in one of your pictures Devin that one of the doors is/was under restoration – a glimmer of life?
They contain a number of original fireplaces and early Victorian plaster ceilings. Some of the other original features comprised bits and bobs of religious paraphernalia 🙂
The council had been asked in writing to list them about 3 years ago, but they weren’t adding any more buildings to their RPS at the time as (they said) they didn’t have the administration and they could only barely manage their existing RPS.
they date from 1848
Yeah, would’ve said they were 1840s. Even though the Georgian reign strictly ended in 1830, the houses are still Georgian in every way, just simplified. Fascinating!
The Irish Times
One of the last substantial sites in Dublin’s south inner city looks set to be redeveloped as Trinity College prepares to embark on a joint venture with a private developer. The TCD Enterprise Centre covers almost five of the six acres between Macken Street, Pearse Street, Grand Canal Quay and the Dart line, and when redeveloped is likely to have well in excess of 92,903sq m (1 million sq ft) of academic research buildings, offices, retail facilities and apartments. Even before TCD has an opportunity to formally embark on the huge project, a half-acre site near the centre of the Enterprise Centre and fronting onto Grand Canal Harbour goes on the market today. Campion Property Consultants is seeking what it calls “a reasonable offer” for the extensive warehouse but has indicated that the owners, the Jordan family who for years supplied crockery to the hotel industry, will also consider a joint venture with “an experienced and asset-rich partner”. An adjoining building owned by the Connaghton family is the only other property in the area not under the control of TCD. The businessman Denis O’Brien owns the Esat office block on the edge of the site fronting onto Grand Canal Quay. All sides agree that the city planners will probably insist on an overall development plan for the site of almost six acres rather than allow individual owners to decide what they want to develop.
This is good news for the area as the existing must rank as one of the most inapprpriate buildings for a prominent city site.
@jimg wrote:
I’d love to know more about Cosgrave’s Illustrated Dictionary of Dublin. There’s also a reference to it in John Finerty’s 19th century coffeetable book – Ireland in Pictures. I couldn’t resist buying a copy of the latter even though it’s available in a digitised form on the web. But besides that neither google nor abebooks revealed anything above what sounds like a fascinating book.
There are several copies of the book-unfortunately for reference only-in the ‘Dublin and Irish Collection’ in Pearse Street Public Library, only a stones through from the buildings being discussed.
There is a very big hole in the ground where work has started on this development
http://www.dublincity.ie/swiftlg/apas/run/WPHAPPDETAIL.DisplayUrl?theApnID=3293/06
Just wondering if anyone has any pics of how finished product is going to look?
Thanks, I knew that but nothing happening there for me, its just a list of docs, nothing opens when they are clicked. Are they opening for others?
- You must be logged in to reply to this topic.
