Press Release
Dublin City Council, with the assistance of the Royal Institute of the Architects of Ireland (RIAI), is running an open ideas design competition for the vacant site of No. 16 Henrietta Street, Dublin 1. The design competition is part of the Henrietta Street Conservation Plan, 2006. The competition opens on Monday 14th April and designs must be received by 27th June 2008.
The Henrietta Street Conservation Plan, 2006 re-affirms the significance of the Historic Street and puts in place policies that endeavour to preserve its significance. The design competition for No. 16 Henrietta Street aims to both establish a design framework for the development of the site while also generating debate and discussion on the challenge of in-fill design in historic settings.
The winning design and short – listed entries will be exhibited in the King’s Inns and Atrium of Dublin City Council in the autumn. A monograph showcasing the winning design, short-listed design and “control design” will be published. Four assessors have been chosen from a range of professional and academic fields, Ali Grehan, Dublin City Architect, Dublin City Council, Gráinne Shaffrey, Shaffrey Associates Architects, Dr. Edward McParland, Department of the History of Art & Architecture, University College Dublin and Trinity College and Eric Parry, Eric Parry Architects, London.
Ends
For Further Information please contact: Charles Duggan, Deputy Heritage Officer, Dublin City Council, Tel. 222 2856 or 087 758 0221.
Notes to the Editor:
Download the Henrietta Street Conservation Plan.
Significance of Henrietta Street
Henrietta Street is of pre-eminence in Dublin City from an architectural and historical point of view. Laid out in 1721 and developed over three successive decades, it is the prototype of urban Georgian terraced architecture in Dublin. The architectural importance of the street is reflected in the vast scale of the houses, which contrasts greatly with the smaller terraced housing of succeeding speculative developments north and south of the Liffey, and the significant presence of the King’s Inns whose granite mass dominates the street to one end. The relative intactness of the streetscape adds even greater significance to Henrietta Street, and this significance is borne out by the endeavours of the owners, residents and institutions, who today, are custodians of this architectural legacy.
No. 16 Henrietta Street
During the early 1740s Luke Gardiner built No. 15 (later altered to form No’s15-16) Henrietta Street concurrently with No’s 13 and 14. It was conceived as a uniform row of three four-bay four-storey over basement houses. The three houses were largely identical in format and size, comprising a large two-storey entrance-stair hall, which gave access to the principal rooms at ground and piano nobile level. In 1828 No. 15 Henrietta Street was divided internally thus creating two houses, dramatically altering the original floor plan. No. 16 was the number allocated to the newly created house. It appears from Ordnance Survey maps of 1878 and 1909 that the rear site of No’s 15/16 was once built upon, presumably by diminutively scaled single or two-storey structures for light industrial use, most likely incorporating the original coach house (mews), enlarged to accommodate more intensive light-industrial uses, as is the case on Henrietta Lane, on the opposite side of the street. The rear site of No’s15/16 was curtailed to facilitate the development of the Henrietta House public housing scheme designed by Herbert Simms in 1939. No. 16 had been derelict since 1927. It was acquired by Dublin Corporation under the Derelict Sites Act 1940 and demolished around 1950. Today the presentation and condition of the site is unsatisfactory comprising an open hard landscaped surface car park.
Re-development of the Site of No. 16
We are now faced with answering the following questions:
Should the site remain vacant or should we now consider the potential in-fill of the site?
What form of architecture is suitable for such a site?
Is it appropriate to reinstate the missing “half” of No. 15 treating the street as an early-to-mid 18th century architectural set piece, or do we address the site by re-looking at the street as a showcase for high quality architecture that is representative of this generation?
Design Considerations
The competition is viewed as an opportunity to explore the following considerations:
The potential for infilling of the site
The appropriateness of reinstatement/new design.
The exploration of new architectural forms within a highly sensitive and architecturally important street such as Henrietta Street.
How to contextualise, in form and materials, a contemporary architectural language within a streetscape that embodies subtly varied Palladian architectural principles built over a 34-year period between c. 1721-1755 (with later alterations), largely expressed through the use of red brick.
The most desirable use for such an in-fill building within a street characterised by residential, fourth level educational, institutional, artistic and cultural use.
Design Approaches
Design approaches are open to each entrant. Approaches may include an in-fill design that is sympathetic to the context and setting without being archaeologically correct or historically precise, and which is not pastiche; and infill design that contrasts strongly with the architectural language, setting and context of Henrietta Street.
Control
In tandem with this open ideas competition, but separate from the competition process, the Council intends to commission a design proposal for an archaeologically precise reinstatement of No. 16. This will be based on all available secondary and primary source material, the site and building context and on-site evidence. This will allow for a thorough assessment of the short listed designs and provoke thought at exhibition stage on the question of a contemporary architectural idiom in an historic setting. This design will only be available to the Jury and will be exhibited along with the short listed entries.