Building for Work II: Offices

Desmond Rea O’Kelly began working on a new headquarters building for the Irish Transport and General Workers Union in 1954. The design evolved through at least four versions before crystallising into the scheme represented by this model. O’Kelly, who was also the building’s structural engineer, proposed a sixty metre (197 feet), seventeen-storey tower, square in plan and transparent in elevation. The original Liberty Hall, headquarters of the Union during the traumatic 1913 Lockout and rebuilt after being badly damaged in Easter Week 1916, was demolished without fanfare in 1958 to make way for its replacement. Construction of the new building began in 1961 and it was completed in early 1965.

Although the mosaic-lined, copper clad, zig-zag roof was just too jazzy for one critic, the building was broadly welcomed by the architectural press. However, it was far from universally popular and continues to divide public opinion. Its original appearance, visible still in the model, was dramatically altered in the wake of a December 1972 car-bomb explosion. A grey putty was applied to the bands of white mosaic which delineated each floor, and in 1973 a reflective film was applied to the glazing, making the building opaque. Ostensibly inserted to counteract solar heat gain, its main benefit was security, a test area of the covered glazing having survived the bomb blast while surrounding windows shattered. The Union itself fell out of love with Liberty Hall in the 2000s and planned to replace it with a taller, broader and deeper tower. The downturn of 2008 ended this project, but the future of Liberty Hall remains uncertain.

Stephenson Gibney & Associates designed several controversial developments, including the ESB headquarters on Fitzwilliam Street (1965, demolished) (24.3), two office blocks at Hume Street (which were halted by preservationists and later built in Georgian pastiche), the Central Bank on Dame Street (1972-80) and the Civic Offices on Wood Quay (1976-86). Other Stephenson Gibney buildings include Hainault House, St Stephen’s Green (1967), the Institute of Advanced Studies, Burlington Road (1971), Merrion Hall, Sandymount (1973), Molyneux House, Bride Street (1973, substantially demolished), and Agriculture House, Kildare Street (1974). After the practice was dissolved in 1976, Gibney designed the Currency Centre, Sandyford (1978), and Stephenson was responsible for the Bord na Móna Headquarters, Baggot Street (1978).

Andy Devane of Robinson Keefe & Devane designed only three office developments in Dublin, two of which were, at the time of their completion, the biggest office developments ever undertaken in the city – the Irish Life Centre (1978 and 1985) and AIB Bankcentre (1979, demolished). Devane was the architect for Stephen Court on St Stephen’s Green (1972), his first venture into office block architecture (24.4).

In terms of office block output, Stephenson Gibney & Associates was matched by only one other practice, Tyndall Hogan Hurley, whose commercial wing was led by Brian Hogan. His work included Lansdowne House, Ballsbridge (1967) (24.5), Telephone House, Marlborough Street (1969), Canada House, St Stephen’s Green (1972, demolished), Oisín House, Pearse Street (1972, demolished), the Setanta Centre, Nassau Street (1976), and two office blocks on Burlington Road (1969 and 1972). Hogan advocated a philosophy that separated him from his peers: he argued that ‘architects are not artists; [they] manipulate other people’s money and reach some sort of balance of all the conflicting priorities. At least I have the intention of making buildings you don’t really notice. I would say, in fact, that the best building is the one you notice least’ (Frank McDonald, The Destruction of Dublin (Dublin, 1985), 52).

There were others too who produced plain, functional office blocks, for example, Desmond Fitzgerald’s O’Connell Bridge House (1964), Burke-Kennedy Doyle’s Shell House, Hatch Street (1969, demolished) and Bowmaker Building, Nassau Street (1970, demolished) Costello Murray Beaumont’s block at Mespil Road (1965, demolished), David Keane & Partners’ Apollo House, Tara Street (1969, demolished), and Lardner & Partners’ Norwich Union, Nassau Street (1963, demolished), Hume House, Ballsbridge (1966, demolished), and Harcourt House, Harcourt Street (1972).

Interspersed with the legion of inconsequential office buildings were a number which made a significant impact for a variety of reasons. Liberty Hall sits firmly in this category, as does: the US Embassy, Ballsbridge (1964), by American architect John Johansen, which established Ballsbridge as the premier office district outside the city centre; the Sugar Company offices on Earlsfort Terrace (1964), the result of an architectural competition won by Boyle and Delaney, raised on a podium and disrupting established building plot lines; British architects Shoolheifer & Burley’s brutalist Fitzwilton House (1969, demolished) set at an angle to the canal bank at Wilton Terrace (24.6); and the divisive brutalist monument, River House on Chancery Street (1975, demolished), by Patrick Sheahan.

Also of note are Downes Meehan Robson’s Irish Life Assurance company headquarters on Mespil Road (1962, demolished), Morris & McCullough’s New Ireland Assurance Company offices on Dawson Street (1964) with later additions by Patrick Campbell (1971), and McCormack Keane & Partners’ Texaco House, Ballsbridge (1972).

These buildings for work are a physical manifestation of Ireland’s short but frenetic burst of prosperity in the 1960s and 1970s. Liberty Hall is prominent among the ever-shortening list of survivors. Despite its significantly altered glazing and ongoing lack of appropriate maintenance, its original architectural intent remains true.

Dr Carole Pollard is an architect and holder of an MA in History of Design from National College of Art and Design, and a PhD from the School of Architecture, Planning & Environmental Policy at University College Dublin. She is a Fellow of the Royal Institute of the Architects of Ireland and served as RIAI President for 2016-17.