York Street
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I’d certainly agree that the mock georgians were a brave decision on the part of the corportation. It seems a shame that they were much easier for people to stomach knocking down compared to the drab flats in Ringsend which currently close off the vista in Grand Canal docks.
Re: Johnglas’ pedigree – were I from Airdrie or somplace like that I’d claim to be an exotic Glaswegian or perhaps he’s a defender of brutalist modernism and has made “the dear green place” his spiritual home!
asmodeus: don’t tempt me – I’m Glasgow bred if not born and as for my being a defender of ‘brutalist modernism’, just read my rants. Can I just say that you’ve defeated your own arguments on the detached-house front; there are many purposely-built detached houses in the city (though not perhaps as many as you would think) which are now flatted. But they are – and read as – detached houses in the townscape. Cities are all about higher density and smaller plots; detached houses in the city are for the fabulously wealthy, the small townee or the incurable suburbanite.
gunter: interesting point; a friend of mine fell in love with the York St houses when visiting Dublin, although I thought they were a bit dull (but ‘pastiche’ has never fazed me). But they were very appropriate in scale and character for that location (before they were muscled out by the aggrandizing tendencies of the RCSI). Your usual skills at a ‘before and after’ would be much appreciated.14/9/2008
Well here is the new Dublin City Council York Street housing scheme designed by Sean Harrington Architects as now reaching completion, comprising 66 apartments surrounding a central courtyard.
Still a few pointers for the snag list…
Perhaps a little busy to the western elevation facing towards Upper Mercer Street, the above York Street frontage is more pleasing in its simplicity and dynamic use of materials.
The use of stack-bonded brickwork encased within a galvanised border is eye-catching and ‘efficient’.
If perhaps overly so in its shouting from the rooftops ‘SOCIAL HOUSING’. Whereas in the early-mid 20th century public housing was defined almost singularly by being of a modern idiom and apartment format, today the four pre-requisite elements are: a) the use of galvanised steel as a cutting-edge-modern-but-between-ourselves-cheap-and-maintainable material, b) mean fenestration, c) a patronisingly quirky use of bright colour, and d) an appearance of over-design. Essentially four elements one would rarely if ever encounter in the private sector.
None of which might I remark are negatives – they’re simply observations from the trends I’ve noted. When they are to be criticised is their employment in an inappropriate manner, nothing of which it has to be said is evident in this scheme, save perhaps a somewhat overly engineered western elevation.
This development is probably the most environmentally sustainable social housing scheme ever built in Dublin, and clearly informs the design through the use of minimal glazing to the narrow north-facing York Street and contrasting expansive frontage facing south. The powder-coated aluminium windows with internal timber facings are extremely well built and insulated (the specification of the glazing is unclear).
The use of colour to the side lights of the projecting cube windows injects much vigour to the perennially gloomy York Street.
The glazed cube is a theme carried throughout the scheme.
The railed frontage to York Street carries through the concept from precedent, and is well detailed.
The new address plaques being erected on the piers are particularly elegant and subtly back-lit. The ground floor elevation behind the railings however is not as successful: overly harsh and clinical, it has a budget render appearance and poorly detailed window sills that do not do justice to the upper floors. Also picking up on detail, my pet hate of ignorant fenestration is by no means limited to pre-1900 – this is simply ugly stuff up here.
Depending so heavily on framed glazing and opting for a factory engineered solution inevitably produces such results. The new St. Luke’s Avenue building by Anthiny Reddy Associates is another recent high-profile building so compromised by cumbersome fenestration that has had little or no design input saving the choice of material and its colour. A real shame in this case too.
The as yet unfinished basement well, most of which is deeper than this and provides ventilation to basement storage and/or car parking. Lovely curved detail.
The rear courtyard makes elegant and fitting use of brick which draws strong references to the history of the site and generates a suitably welcoming domestic atmosphere. The elevation to Upper Mercer Street features very well designed animating commercial/retail units, as does the main corner frontage.
The scheme will make use of five gas-powered district heating systems, each serving approximately 13 apartments with a central condensing gas boiler. Domestic hot water will be provided by five solar thermal panels with back up from highly efficient gas boilers at peak load. Because of the volume of gas to be consumed, it can be purchased at commercial rates, further lowering costs, while the efficiency of the scheme as a whole means each unit will consume half that of a typical apartment. A water management system has also been incorporated.
Overall an average/good scheme – if it has an attractive face it has to be to York Street – and seemingly more informed by environmental credentials than architectural swagger. O’Donnell & Twomey’s new Cork Street social housing is a heart-warming delight by comparison. This leaves me a little cold.
(Incidentally an excellent series of giant paper maps were recently erected between the bays of the ground floor showing the progression of development on the site from the earliest of times to the present day. It was a great idea, and a shame it came down so quickly. We need more of this type of thing from the public sector)
Next door the site DCC sold to the Royal College of Surgeons is under extreme excavation. If I recall they applied for a four storey basement, and is surely one of the deepest excavations ever conducted in Dublin. It’s an incredible drop on location.
Difficult to make out if this is Calp bedrock or in fact a former quarry site.
It’s not as bad as that, fergair, although I don’t know what you do about the defective cladding on the gable – future problems?
Are the bottom layers of strata on the last pics the famed Dublin calp (limestone)? It’s fearsome looking stuff.
PS Great stuff, GrahamH, good forensic pics and a consistent critique of the development; need more of that.Its certainly not as bad as that. Thanks a million for the pics/ critique GrahamH.
Since those pictures were taken the scheme has steadily advanced in its finishing. Its actually great. It reinstates the enclosure of York st, makes a quality residential courtyard, the corner element is sophisticated and elegant, making a lovely transition which is infinitely better than the vast majority of private blocks attempting the same.
From an urban point of view, it ticks all the boxes, active corner use, mix of typologies and tenure, On street access to stair cores etc.
The detailing is well thought out and fairly well executed overall, the apartments are spacious, flexible and energy efficient. Its by far the most sustainable and efficient block in the city at the moment.
Overall I really cant compliment this enough. Of course elements in it are cheap – its social housing – budget is a serious concern but the overall quality of the development shines through. Go down and have a look at it in the flesh and I really think you’ll be pleasantly suprised.
O this case study makes very interesting reading about the evolution of the scheme.
http://www.chr.ie/training_and_education/energy_efficiency_for_sustainable_communities_2008.530.html
(About half way down)I think it’s dreadful and have thought so since the “brickwork” was unveiled. The projecting windows look ridiculous, the whole scheme screams of a lack of imagination. To be honest Graham, I expected a damning critique so am a bit surprised by most of your comments. As for the snag on the side elevation, I hope it’s not an intentional feature, much like MOL’s (?) one at Broadstone.
@jdivision wrote:
I think it’s dreadful and have thought so since the “brickwork” was unveiled.
I’ve never been a fan of tiled-on brickwork, but at least here it’s just used as a framed panel and the colour is perfect, if the intention was to reference Dublin brickwork from the early Georgian period, i.e. when York Street was originally developed.
I also like the composition of the York Street elevation which does a nice job in varying the module width (not dissimilar to original plot widths) and it has a base and, best of all, a top. Even on narrow streets, roof-scapes can be important and this one (York Street frontage) has an elegant roof-scape.
It all breaks down a bit on the Mercer Street frontage, but eventually an opposing streetscape here may reduce the impact of the clutter on the roof here and the dodgy composition.
The DCC/Sean Harrington/York Street scheme is up for shaving in the current ‘ARCHITECTURE’ (RIAI journal)! The piece is by a Dr. Jonathan Hale, who hales from Nottingham.
Normally RIAI feature reviews are so sweet and sugary, reading too many of them would rot your eyes, but low! . . . . along comes a sugar-free review, even incorporating a couple of mild rebukes:
”Compositionally the elevations adopt the principle of expressing each apartment as a distinctive unit, which in some areas – particularly on Mercer Street – results in a slightly fragmentary collage of competing forms. The more sober and taught plane of the longer York Street frontage strikes a much happier balance of size and scale . . . ”I could be waiting six months for someone to point out that this not a dissimilar view to that expressed by gunter above, so I’m just going to point it out myself 😉
In the same publication, the RIAI president’s column cuts loose and carries out a high school shooting that leaves ‘Luddites’, the ‘angst ridden’, ‘Jahadists’, ‘Eco Artistos’, ‘suited proles’, ‘contrarians’, ‘neo cons’ and ‘Evrironmental Athesists’ strewn about the place in the ensuing slaughter, . . . outstanding stuff, but we’ll deal with this in the appropriate place.
@Lillian Doyle wrote:
As someone who grew up in York Street (I have been out of it longer than I was in it). I would like to let you know there were some very decent people in these flats. In fact it was only in latter years that the criminal group moved in that is when most of the old tennants moved to other accommodation. I would guess you had all your belongings on the back seat of your car and can only say that the same thing would happen in London, Manchester, Madrid, Cork etc or any other major city. You can not tar everyone with the same brush.
, Good girl Lillian doyle,
I was born in York Street Number 23c, and my family name is mc dougall… and I am with you girl , it was very differant when we were little ‘we had so many friend’s that we used to play
on the street ,we were children and allowed to have a childhood, we skipped , we roller skated we had a friend who taught us how to ride a bike we would get chalk and draw on the road’s the pavement ,played hopscotch, so those of you who choose to judge DONT like the lady said it was a very decent place until the riff raff moved in later,by the way the lounge area was large the Kitchen was small the bedroom’s were e decent size and yes we did have a bathroom with a white bath and white sink ..was very clean and we had Mother’s who kept us spotless and our bed’s had the whitest clean sheet’s on, our mother’s brought us up to the best of their ability , The back yard was a great big area and yes there was green grass also, so to those of you who like to judge please don’t because no one hasw the right to judge other’s.Best Regard’s
Carmel parakh.
Nice to hear from some residents. It’s wrong to think that everyone in a street with some social problems is a criminal. Very often there is a small element causing trouble and everyone else would love to be rid of them.
This new apartment scheme doesn’t look great from York Street but it’s really impressive inside. The sunny courtyard works really well with lots of soft planting and reflected light from the windows. High quality materials and no sense of ‘corporation housing’. It just looks very upmarket. Even the lobbies, common areas, stairs are perfectly finished. Can’t fault it.
By comparison, the blocks on the other side of Mercer Street look like prisons.
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