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ajParticipant
If ever there was a place for an open air museum of Georgian Dublin this is it.
The tourist board are only too keen to stress Dublins Georgian heritage to the yanks et al. but where is there any real museum of one of the most important periods in the citys history.
The Palace stables in Armagh was restored as a living tourist attraction the Ulster American Folk park is similiar. The Ulster American Folk park get close on 200,000 vistors a year depsite being in Tyrone.
Surely Heinretta Street is perfect a such a living museum. What do you think?
ajParticipant@Jas wrote:
so henrietta street has been left to rot since 1992…….
still no progress 2009.
I walked around Heinretta Street on Saturday and could not believe the condition the street is in.
Surely there has to be a self sustaining / funding use for this street.
ajParticipantits would appear that they arent rebuilding the west tower which stikes me as a bit hald arssed
ajParticipant@lauder wrote:
Good news. Would be interesting to see some drawings.
are we going to see the replacement of the horrific 6O’S facade?
ajParticipant@CraigFay wrote:
I’m confused, which one do you think they are building? Because they are building the top one of the two pics you posted.
i am confused as well, I had been trying to reconcile what was actually being built to the first picture and cant, looks much closer to the design below.
can someone confirm what is happening?:confused:
ajParticipant@jdivision wrote:
Unless they go for a Henrietta Street-style modern interpretation!
dont even get me started about the conservation of Dublins Most importatn set piece!
ajParticipantif ever there was a case for pastiche then this is it… surely the entire fitzwilliam street facade must be reinstated or else we risk repeating the orginal mistake!
ajParticipantit would appear not!!!!
ESB competition for world-class redesign of HQ
THE ESB intends to use the opportunity provided by the redevelopment of its head office in Fitzwilliam Street, Dublin, which it announced last week, to create a “world-class example of sustainable and innovative headquartersâ€.
According to documentation issued last Friday by the ESB, one of the key criteria for a design contest for the new complex will be “the participants’ proposals for a solution to the aspect of the Lower Fitzwilliam Street facadeâ€.
This facade was the most controversial element of the existing headquarters built in 1970 – following an earlier architectural competition won by the late Arthur Gibney and Sam Stephenson – because it meant demolishing 16 Georgian houses.
At the time, conservationists were appalled that Dublin’s longest Georgian facade, from Mount Street to Leeson Street, was to be broken by a modern building fronted by precast concrete window panels and set on a podium.
The ESB brought in Sir John Summerson, a leading English architectural historian, to give his opinion on the merit of the houses to be demolished.
Notoriously, he condemned them as “simply one damned house after anotherâ€.
Ten years ago, the ESB gave serious consideration to a plan by Sam Stephenson that would have involved refronting the office block with a Georgian facade as a Millennium project.
However, this proposal was deemed to be problematic due to the floor levels.
In the latest competition, architects are being told to assume that all existing buildings – except protected structures, including No 12 Lower Fitzwilliam Street – “will be demolished to allow the entire site to become available for redevelopmentâ€.
Participants who are shortlisted following the initial qualification stage will be requested to present detailed design proposals for an exemplar sustainable headquarters in the centre of Dublin.
It will comprise a floor area of between 35,000 and 45,000sq metres.
“The proposed designs should demonstrate respect for the surrounding Georgian streetscape and protected structures,†states the contest documentation.
Three winning designs are to be selected.
The competition, which is being held independently of the Royal Institute of the Architects of Ireland (RIAI), is to be judged by a panel headed by ESB chairman Lochlann Quinn.
It will also include John Redmond, the company secretary and head of corporate affairs.
Others on the jury are Joe Maher, retired ESB director and former chief financial officer; Prof Owen Lewis, an architect and engineer who now heads Sustainable Energy Ireland; and an “international architect/urban designer†yet to be appointed.
The jury’s assessment of submissions will be assisted by a technical panel.
The weightings to be given to different aspects of each submission are 40 per cent for “commerciality and buildabilityâ€, including value for money; 40 per cent for “design and aesthetic qualitiesâ€; and 20 per cent for “compatibility . . . with [the] receiving environmentâ€.
The top three competition entries will each be awarded a prize of €30,000, and the final decision on the award of “any follow-up contract†is be made by the ESB’s board on the recommendation of the jury.
This will follow negotiations with the shortlisted entrants.
This article appears in the print edition of the Irish Times
ajParticipantif ever there was a building crying out for restoration this is it, would be something special!
ajParticipant@shaun wrote:
I walked along the back of this building, i.e. Railway street, yesterday and it can only be described as surreal.
I challenge anyone on this site to come up with a better example of urban dereliction from anywhere in Europe.
I walked the whole area between Buckingham street, Summerhill, Gardner street and lets be honest, it’s a massive derelict site, anything new that has been built there is worse than any Georgian slum tenement.
There are no Georgian terraced houses left, bar a few at thee beginning of Gardner street. The few left standing are basically filthy wrecks. Those photos that Tommyt send move me like they have other people.
Precise copies of these houses should have been rebuilt, or else complete restoration. This is not a serious proposition of course. What we are left with is a urben decay and dereliction that would have rivalled the Bronx in the 70’s.
As you go uptown to Hardwicke place and the church there, you will pass one slum street after another. Parnell street is the filthiest street in the world. Go up Hill street and it’s just weird, were there actually Georgian houses where those flats are ?
I have always loved Dublins derelict sites and run-down urban decay feel. But what was done to this part of Dublin is the biggest crimes against architecture and culture ever committed in in the British Isles. Phew, got that of my chest, feels good.
I agree wholeheartly with your comments. The area is an absolute disgrace, as is much of the North Georgian Core.
ajParticipant. There are vast parts of the city that could be residentised again.
I agree with the sentiment .
We could effectively end the sprawl , bring higher density to the inner city while at the same time restoring large swathes of what are now near derelict townhouses.
How do you think we could achieve this?
ajParticipant@johnny21 wrote:
Good photos. ihateawake the building is liam carrolls development. AIB HQ. More renders on architects website. http://www.totarch.ie
its anglo irish banks new HQ, not AIBs Both BOI and AIB are planning on conslidating there back offices on one site. Given the number of permises both are currently in this will require 2 big buildings probably high rise
ajParticipant@dan_d wrote:
I remember someone here saying these are “not things you simply deconstruct”….major lurker btw…. so is he goin to box it up in glass or something
That may have been me.Apologies if I seem to be lurking, but I don’t have a massive amount of time on my hands to spend reading every single item on these boards, and posting replies.I manage to occasionally read stuff, that’s about it!
On topic, I don’t understand as much as anyone else, why you’d go to the trouble of digging a massive hole in the ground,pouring something up to ground level and then abandon it..possibly indefinitely…in the middle of a high profile development, part of which will open in the next couple of months.Its an eyesore, a massive waste of money, I imagine it’s a safety issue aswell to leave it sitting there in close proximity to a public building that will attract crowds of people, and overall, a complete waste of time.Takes away from the credibility of the entire project aswell.But it seems to be the way things are going in the industry.I have no doubt the tower will be completed but I would bet that it will be fininshed as an office building not as a residential tower.
ajParticipant@GrahamH wrote:
So no one’s got it yet 🙁
Well here’s another in the meantime – one of the curiosities of the city that both the location and an explanation for would be welcome! I’d like to know more about it.
marlboro st beside DIT building
ajParticipant@GrahamH wrote:
Yes it probably would. There’s a huge coal hole cover outside Morrison Chambers on Nassau Street – one of the biggest Edwardian(ish) office developments in the city – that appears contemporaneous to the building, so it looks like old habits died hard.
Here’s another quick one. I will be very impressed with anyone who gets this – you need to be a snooper of the highest order to know where it is. Then again, it’s in such a surprisingly frequented place that you may just have stumbled upon it one day, should curiousity have gotten the better of you – as in this case.
It’s not in a graveyard or obscure city park…
looks like the entrance to St Michans crypt
June 16, 2007 at 9:16 pm in reply to: Leinster Lawn expected to be restored during summer recess 2005 #752988ajParticipant@GrahamH wrote:
16/6/2007
As this thread contains quite a bit of Kildare Place material, this might as well go here. I came across this photograph of Kildare Place from c.1890 in the National Library Collection. What a radically different place it was 🙁
© National Library of IrelandAlso note the Georgian terrrace in the distance forming one side of Merrion Street prior to demolition for Government Buildings/Royal College of Science.
The grand Victorian on the site of the present Department of Agriculture was the Church of Ireland training college according to Frank McDonald. Acquired in the early 1960s by John Laing, a large UK contruction firm, they got permission in 1963 to build an eight-storey office block on the site, but nothing happened until the State stepped in in 1969, paid some of the site acquisition costs, and then got Irish Life of all people to bank-roll the construction of the block, to be built by Laing. Notoriously of course, Irish Life thereby acquired the freehold of the building, and rented it to the State on a tenure of 150 years! (it’s since been bought out). Indeed by 1984, the rent annual rent amounted to the cost of building it in the first place!
The two Georgians as pictured before were demolished by the State in 1957, and replaced by McGrath’s brown brick wall, now rsther picturesquely coverd in ivy. Apparently a Governemnt minister at the time said: ‘I was glad to see them go. They stood for everything I hate’. Here they are being stripped down.
The doorcase is remarkably similar to Richard Castle’s surviving house on O’Connell Street :(. Rather conveniently, the houses were demolished by the OPW at the same time that the State Apartments in the Castle were being restored/rebuilt from scratch, and two late 18th century fireplaces salvaged from Number 3 Kildare Place were reused there: one in the Wedgewood Room, and another in a fomer Viceregal bedroom to the rear.
Anyone any idea what/where this building is to the rear? Where Huguenot House now stands?
Also the enormous bulk of Agriculture House, as designed by Sam Stephenson, then the largest office block ever built in Ireland.
© fantasyjackpalace.comAnd Kildare Place today.
It really is heartbreaking to see what was was done to the city..
ajParticipant@Sloan wrote:
An Bord Pleanala case details for 222271
Demolition of no. 12(a protected structure) and no. 13 Upper Dorset Street and construction of 6 storey mixed use development comprising retail use and 9 apartments and all ancillary works. 12/13 Dorset Street Upper, Dublin 1.
Lodged: 06/03/2007
Party 1: Shane Murphy*()
Party 2: Senator David Norris*(Appellant)
Party 3: An Taisce*(Appellant)
Party 4: St. Saviours Dominican Priory*(Appellant)
Party 5: Aids Fund Housing Project*(Appellant)
EIS: No
Issue Code 1: Protected Structure
Planning Authority: Dublin City Council Reg. Ref.: 6907/06
Case is due to be decided by 09-07-2007lets all object !
ajParticipant@Paul Clerkin wrote:
Redevelopment of Richard Brinsley Sheridan’s house appealed
The Irish TimesDublin City Council has failed in its duty to protect a symbol of Irish cultural achievement by approving plans to demolish the birthplace of 18th century playwright Richard Brinsley Sheridan, according to Senator David Norris. Last month the council granted permission to Shane Murphy for the demolition of the Whig MP’s home at 12 Upper Dorset Street to make way for an apartment block. The building is in a derelict condition and is missing its top two floors. Murphy bought number 12 six months ago and number 13 an adjoining property, which will also be demolished, a year ago.
http://www.ireland.com/newspaper/property/2007/0322/1173880692811.html
yet another disgrace.. I am certain that the Corpo have given up trying to protect whats left of the North Georgian Inner City
ajParticipant@Paul Clerkin wrote:
From Bethesda to Cinerama
Marc ZimmermannA number of movie theatres have shaped the cinematic landscape of the city over the past ninety-eight years. They include Dublin’s first dedicated cinema (the VOLTA, 1909), the city’s first purpose-built CinemaScope screen (STATE, ’54), the first twinned venue (SAVOY, ’69) and Ireland’s first multiplex (UCI TALLAGHT, ’90). A further number of both well- and lesser-known venues forms a significant part of the capital’s architectural and social history. One of these was the DORSET. The building it occupied for over seven decades had an unusual life, serving three di-verse purposes over two centuries.
heart breaking insnt it!
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