ctesiphon
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I was misled by my old Art History lecture (who should remain nameless). 😮
Luckily, you were here to set me straight. 🙂
Thanks for that.Sue- “…only mythical associations.” Substitute the word ‘cultural’ (or ‘social’) for ‘mythical’ and your case begins to look very shaky. Less tangible qualities are no less valuable.
You would rank Archer’s or Wiggins Teape above Tara? Or architecturally important buildings above cultural landscapes?
Without over-rehearsing the Tara arguments here (sigh), a train line would bring relief to thousands of people in Meath, as would jobs in Meath, as would adherence to the NSS, as would…
“The M3- A failure of the imagination.” (TM)Hutton- before I upbraid you too I shall ask, are your comments about building/destroying sarcastic? Please tell me it is so.
Archer’s- sadly missed and rightly replaced.
WT- sadly missed.
Tara-…To rewind for a second:
Graham-
I always thought the oldest building on O’Connell Street was the Georgian building near the north end on the west side? Can’t think what flanks it, but I’m sure you know the one I mean: pedimented doorcase, sash windows, etc.
Maybe the salient fact is that it’s the only one that remains in anything like its orignal appearance.Open to correction… 🙂
There was a book published in the late 1990s on the history of Irish windows, called ‘The legacy of light’, written by Nessa Roche.
Also, the conservation guidelines published by the Department of the Environment includes a booklet dedicated to windows- I think they’re online at http://www.environ.ie.
As to what types of windows are popular in Ireland, well it wouldn’t be wooden ones. 🙂
Joking aside, PVC has reigned supreme in new builds until relatively recently.Are you in Ireland? If so, just step outside your door. If not, just look at, say, the Irish Times Property website (http://www.nicemove.ie) or the website of the National Inventory of Architectural Heritage (http://www.buildingsofireland.ie), or any of the range of great pictures of buildings found elsewhere on this site. Also, see the thread re the Edwardian Farmhouse on this site, where Graham Hickey gives some of the info you need.
My suspicions were initially aroused as the definition of ‘development’ in the 2000 Act includes works ‘on, over or under land’, so a project such as this would have required planning permission in Ireland.
Then somebody told me to enter the competition on the website. Do it and see (even though the date has passed).
Still, had me going for a while. 😮Cheers TP. Couldn’t have put it better myself. 🙂
Graham- does this answer your question (provide necessary ammunition? 😉 ) re duty of care on O’Connell St.?
@Thomond Park wrote:
it is ultimately the owners of buildings who are liable under the protected structure legislation.
.It was my understanding that under the 2000 Act, occupiers also have a responsibility to protect and maintain Protected Structures. Local Authorities have powers to request that works be carried out to protect the character of either the PS itself or of the ACA in which a building (not necessarily a PS) is located (Sections 59 & 60 of the 2000 Act).
You might be right to say that ‘ultimately’ it is the responsibility of the owners, but it gives the wrong impression about the duties of occupiers.A minor point, but one worth making, I think.
Also, this is relevant to Graham’s point about bye-laws and duty of care.
I once heard a girl in Busaras telling a friend about her course in Transport Logistics- don’t know where it was run, though. Pretty sure it was an IT in the south (from the context).
I checked last night- Rothery suggests Dermot O’Toole (1911-1971) as a possible main hand, though he’s diplomatic enough not to come down too heavily against DFitzGerald just in case.
(Rothery, S., Ireland and the new architecture, 1900-1940, pp.214-219.)
Off the point a little, but I’m not sure Desmond Fitzgerald designed the original terminal. Sure, it’s generally attributed to him, but Sean Rothery’s ‘Ireland and the New Architecture’ points out that much of the design work was done while DF was out of the country. I can’t remember the name of the team member to whom SR (implicitly) attributes it- my own copy of the book is at home and Richview Library is now on summer hours. O’Toole? Byrne? Drat! I’ll be back…
Ever get the feeling that if Tara was in Waterford none of this messing would have happened?
I recall a case a few years ago (late 1990s?) where an agency (NRA? Dept of Transport?) wanted to upgrade a road in Co. Waterford. They had two choices: the sensible choice that trimmed land off a few farms/estates along the route; or the other one that removed the boundary walls and shelter belt of trees along the perimeter of Mount Congreve, i.e. the planting that created the microclimate that made Mount Congreve one of the most significant plant collections in the whole of the British Isles- regarded by those in the know as of International significance. Cullen pressed for the latter, mainly for political reasons. (Well, it was hardly for conservation reasons.)
It appears to me that Cullen is happy to support conservation causes where there are votes to be got, but otherwise not. Hardly the definition of a conscientious conservationist.Well, my fair-weather friend, remind me to look you up in a real crisis.
Kissinger/Nobel Peace Prize/Satire/Tom Lehrer anyone?
😀
I hadn’t realised just how acute the bed shortage is in the Midlands- not just A&E but Maternity too.
Though these will presumably be water births?Andrew Duffy wrote:I think that is the Riverside Gateway development, designed by Tom Philips and Associates and financed by Fordmount Properties. QUOTE]Last time I looked, Tom Phillips and Associates were Town Planning Consultants. Is there another TPA that I’m not aware of? The practice is growing, and has an architect/planner in its employ, but I don’t think that building is one of theirs. They may have been the planning consultants for the project?
Anyone else want to take credit for it? :rolleyes:
For the full story of Portlaw, there’s an MUBC Thesis in the Architecture library in UCD (Richview) on the history and development of the village. It was written by, I think, Majella Walsh, in around 1995.
I also have an article from a journal somewhere on the village- if I can find it I’ll post the reference here, though it doesn’t say much more than the thesis.Great to see the buildingsofireland.ie website finally up and running- the NIAH has been doing worthwhile work for many years now, but much of it was not published. Keeping electronic records seems the way to go, rather than expensive print publications that quickly go out of date.
Check out the following link. The main house is the third entry on page 2. The others are the demesne buildings and associated structures.
http://www.buildingsofireland.ie/niah/search.jsp?type=highlights&county=WA&hid=12&page=2
Michael- would the interesting gateway you mention be the one at the head of Portlaw village? If so, I concur. What a little gem! One of the gates led to the factory, the other to the main house. The gates were also opened by an ingenious cog mechanism, the remains of which are still in situ.
Portlaw was a model industrial village (think Saltaire, Bourneville etc, but much earlier). Though not documented anywhere, my own belief is that it’s layout derives from St Petersburg- the radial ‘avenues’ focusing on a central feature. I know this was a standard Baroque feature (Sixtus V in Rome et al) but crucially the Malcolmson family of Portlaw had trading links with St Petersburg. The similarity is too close to be a coincidence.
Though a little dejected when I last visited (1999?), Portlaw is still one of my favourite villages in Ireland. A real one-off. And I believe it has turned a corner recently by becoming a commuter settlement for nearby Waterford city. (I know commuter towns aren’t ideal, but in this case I make an exception.)http://www.buildingsofireland.ie/niah/search.jsp?type=highlights&county=WA&hid=11&page=1
It may come as no surprise, then, to discover that Waterford County is my favourite in the country. (Laois and Clare come next- and me a Dub! Hope the IRDA don’t get wind of this- bleedin’ city interloper me! 😉 )
Boyler- for Art Nouveau, start with Sean Rothery’s ‘Ireland and the new architecture’ book. What little we had is mostly gone or changed beyond recognition.
For info on the Parliament House, that McParland book ‘Public architecture in Ireland 1680-1760’ is the best place to start. It has illustrations, and collects and summarises the various articles Dr McParland has written in different journals/books.Michael- Your point is a good one about Castletown Cox- it does have Baroque (well, Irish Baroque) elements. As I pointed out above, many buildings were a hybrid of Palladian, Baroque, classical, etc. I think it’s one of the best thing we have going for our historic architecture- the fact that there was little adherence to any major style- a la carte classicism? Don’t know if this was due to many of the designers being ‘gentleman architects’.
And Curraghmore. Aah Curraghmore. I’ve often thought it would make a great town. The picture above doesn’t show the 300 ft long courtyard at the other side. On plan, the footprint looks like a tuning fork. Such a fascinating house- contains a tower house in its core (hence the unusual massing), was comprehensively reworked in the eighteenth century (hand of John Roberts? [Waterford’s Georgian master]). It even has a stag on the parapet, reminiscent of the Stupinigi Lodge in Turin (about which I know little). You’ve hit the nail on the head- they don’t come more Baroque than Curraghmore.
As far as I know it’s still lived in- certainly was in the late 1990s. And I recall seeing an episode of Nationwide, maybe a year ago, in which two people interviewed seemed to be living in part of one of the stable ranges- telltale signs were lunette windows, pleached trees in the courtyard and rugged window dressings.
The image above comes from last year’s NIAH Waterford County survey. I worked on the precursor to that survey and recommended that the building should be of International signoficance. Don’t know whether the re-survey felt the same, but I still think it’s the case. A real gem.In a nutshell (’cause I’m crazy busy)-
The key to this debate is religion. In England, there was a battle of the styles between austere Palladianism and exuberant Baroque in the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries, roughly along the lines of Protestants vs Catholics. This was an echo of the early seventeenth century, when the Jameses (I and II) and the Charleses (I and II) were fighting it out (English Civil War time), and Inigo Jones was trying to import Palladian classicism into England. This underlines the importance of the client in architecture (then as now)- if the architect’s style didn’t suit, he didn’t get to build,
Early eighteenth century Irish architecture was a curious hybrid of Palladianmism and Baroque- see Pearce’s Parliament House as an example (severe classicism allied to a Baroque spatial sensibility). This was no doubt due to the fact that he was Vanbrugh’s nephew (or at least a close relation), combined with the Molesworths’ (Robert and John) andd others’ taste for severe Palladianism as seen in their championing of Alessandro Galilei for work at Casltetown (the home of Speaker Conolly- see the Parliament connection?), which rubbed off on Pearce. Rubbed off? He wanted to work!
Echoing their English counterparts, the Irish gentry (i.e. Protestant landowning classes) preferred a plain style of building (with its quality coming from careful proportioning, and its exuberance appearing on the inside)- some have seen this as a reflection of the Protestant concept of maintaining a reserved personal exterior. (This reminds me of the great line in ‘Gosford Park’ where a male character tells his wife to stop crying because people might think they’re Italian! [or something like that]).
So in essence, while we had no doctrinaire Baroque architecture as such, many Baroque elements crept into other areas.
I must correct you though, Boyler, on one minor detail- the high point of Baroque in Europe was the mid- to late-seventeenth century (Borromini’s Roman churches are my own particular favourite- 1660s). It gave way in many cases to Rococo wispy plasterwork and a general disappearance of the ‘muscular’ quality of true Baroque. The date is, however, correct for Ireland, where things generally happen a bit later than elsewhere (architectural styles, Thatcherism, etc…) :rolleyes:Sorry this is a bit disjointed. Check out Edward McParland’s writings for a very fine analysis.
Michael-
I just checked the http://www.buildingsofireland.ie site, and it appears that Laois was never published. This is a pity, and surprising, as when I left my job there in 2001 it was sitting in cardboard boxes ready to go. Now why did I leave? Oh that’s right…Sorry if I got your hopes up.
Maybe if you contact the NIAH office directly they could help. The material is certainly in existence.
Aah if it isn’t my old friend Sun Tzu- calling him into the service of planning and architecture sure makes a change from his hijacking by management consultants the world over.
I did consider, very briefly, doing a thesis on ‘Planning and Go’, Go being that most ancient board game of strategy- makes chess look like tiddlywinks. The Art of War has been applied to Go for as long as the two have been in existence.
I just couldn’t find an angle on the subject- maybe I’ll save it for my PhD? 😮Thanks for the leads on the pedestrian stuff too- much info to be incorporated. No doubt I’ll be back to you with more thought-provoking questions soon. 🙂
