This book presents an architectural overview of Dublin’s mass-housing building boom from the 1930s to the 1970s. During this period, Dublin Corporation built tens of thousands of two-storey houses, developing whole communities from virgin sites and green fields at the city’s edge, while tentatively building four-storey flat blocks in the city centre. Author Ellen Rowley examines how and why this endeavour occurred. Asking questions around architectural and urban obsolescence, she draws on national political and social histories, as well as looking at international architectural histories and the influence of post-war reconstruction programmes in Britain or the symbolisation of the modern dwelling within the formation of the modern nation. Critically, the book tackles this housing history as an architectural and design narrative. It explores the role of the architectural community in this frenzied provision of housing for the populace. Richly illustrated with architectural drawings and photographs from contemporary journals and the private archives of Dublin-based architectural practices, this book will appeal to academics and researchers interested in the conditions surrounding Dublin’s housing history.
This thesis seeks to address and synthesize three fundamental, personal concerns: (l) a design process which attempts to integrate various yet complementary design theories, (2) urban living environments in general, and (3) hill housing in specific. Herein, being "on the edge" connotes not only the sense of place, upon a hillside, but the notion that no singular theory attributable to one designer/theorist presents the "correct" or "best" way to building/dwelling/making pl ace. The contents arc arranged in four parts;. The first part deals with the defining of a design process as an amalgamation of different, and possible divergent, yet related thoughts on architectural design. In fact, many different architects or theorists expound upon similar, if not exactly the same topics; I call these corresponding thoughts "parallels." These "parallels," comprising Part One, are grouped into the follm·ling categories: (1) MIT "built form" theories, (2) Theories of Place, (3) Inclusive Architecture/Participatory Processes, (4) Environmental memory and Associative images, (5) Body-Image theories, (6) Relation to Dance/Movement/Choreography, (7) Relation to Other Arts/Language, (8) Opposites, and (9) Variety. The second part, coincidental with the beginning of a design process, reviews the current literature and other resources on the topic of hill housing as a type, making observations from the field as well as coordinating known "patterns" into a "language" for later reference. Part Three makes use of a photo description/ analysis of the site within its context (Mason Path on Corey Hill in Brookline), a program for housing and associated mixed uses, and a list of design objectives as a link between the general approach and the projective design. Part Four consists of an account, a literal "diary," of a five-week exploration in the design of a multi-family hill housing project on an urban site, as a means of testing out some of the theoretical processes mentioned in Part One. It is not intended that the work in this part be complete, (not could it, short of being built, inhabited, essentially "dwelled in, ") but representative of an interactive process at the schematic stages. The aim of the thesis is not so much to impress upon the reader the intrinsic value of any one specific principle referred to, as much as to, hopefully, part new interest in clarifying what is mutual, what is collective, and thus perhaps more valid, in our approach toward quality architecture.
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER NEW YORK TIMES • 10 BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR NATIONAL BESTSELLER The Atlantic: 10 Best Books of 2022 Best Books of the Year: Washington Post, New Yorker, Salon, Foreign Affairs, New Statesman, Chicago Public Library, Vroman's “[L]ike reading a great tragicomic Irish novel.” —James Wood, The New Yorker “Masterful . . . astonishing.” —Cullen Murphy, The Atlantic "A landmark history . . . Leavened by the brilliance of O'Toole's insights and wit.” —Claire Messud, Harper’s Winner • 2021 An Post Irish Book Award — Nonfiction Book of the Year • from the judges: “The most remarkable Irish nonfiction book I’ve read in the last 10 years”; “[A] book for the ages.” A celebrated Irish writer’s magisterial, brilliantly insightful chronicle of the wrenching transformations that dragged his homeland into the modern world. Fintan O’Toole was born in the year the revolution began. It was 1958, and the Irish government—in despair, because all the young people were leaving—opened the country to foreign investment and popular culture. So began a decades-long, ongoing experiment with Irish national identity. In We Don’t Know Ourselves, O’Toole, one of the Anglophone world’s most consummate stylists, weaves his own experiences into Irish social, cultural, and economic change, showing how Ireland, in just one lifetime, has gone from a reactionary “backwater” to an almost totally open society—perhaps the most astonishing national transformation in modern history. Born to a working-class family in the Dublin suburbs, O’Toole served as an altar boy and attended a Christian Brothers school, much as his forebears did. He was enthralled by American Westerns suddenly appearing on Irish television, which were not that far from his own experience, given that Ireland’s main export was beef and it was still not unknown for herds of cattle to clatter down Dublin’s streets. Yet the Westerns were a sign of what was to come. O’Toole narrates the once unthinkable collapse of the all-powerful Catholic Church, brought down by scandal and by the activism of ordinary Irish, women in particular. He relates the horrific violence of the Troubles in Northern Ireland, which led most Irish to reject violent nationalism. In O’Toole’s telling, America became a lodestar, from John F. Kennedy’s 1963 visit, when the soon-to-be martyred American president was welcomed as a native son, to the emergence of the Irish technology sector in the late 1990s, driven by American corporations, which set Ireland on the path toward particular disaster during the 2008 financial crisis. A remarkably compassionate yet exacting observer, O’Toole in coruscating prose captures the peculiar Irish habit of “deliberate unknowing,” which allowed myths of national greatness to persist even as the foundations were crumbling. Forty years in the making, We Don’t Know Ourselves is a landmark work, a memoir and a national history that ultimately reveals how the two modes are entwined for all of us.
This book examines the architectural design of housing projects in Ireland from the mid-twentieth century. This period represented a high point in the construction of the Welfare State project where the idea that architecture could and should shape and define community and social life was not yet considered problematic. Exploring a period when Ireland embraced the free market and the end of economic protectionism, the book is a series of case studies supported by critical narratives. Little known but of high quality, the schemes presented in this volume are by architects whose designs helped determine future architectural thinking in Ireland and elsewhere. Aimed at academics, students and researchers, the book is accompanied by new drawings and over 100 full colour images, with the example studies demonstrating rich architectural responses to a shifting landscape.
Combining how-to with why-to, '9 Ways to Make Housing for People' lays out the core principles that David Baker Architects uses to help communities develop great urban housing. Written for architects and residents - as well as officials, developers, and planners - this book is a kit of parts: nine proven strategies for getting the best outcomes for housing in urban contexts. Detailed explorations and comprehensive case studies show how to apply and combine the principles creatively to meet the needs of sites, people, and budgets. Pragmatic and imaginative, this book is a modern manual for urban housing - getting it built and making it great.
Bringing together an international team of scholars, this book offers new perspectives on the impact that the Bauhaus and its teaching had on a wide range of artistic practices. Three of the fields in which the Bauhaus generated immediately transformative effects were housing, typography, and photography. Contributors go further to chart the surprising relation of the school to contemporary developments in hairstyling and shop window display in unprecedented detail. New scholarship has detailed the degree to which Bauhaus faculty and students set off around the world, but it has seldom paid attention to its impact in communist East Germany or in countries like Ireland where no Bauhäusler settled. This wide-ranging collection makes clear that a century after its founding, many new stories remain to be told about the influence of the twentieth century’s most innovative arts institution. The book will be of interest to scholars working in art history, design history, photography, and architectural history.
This thesis proposes an approach to the design of urban housing which uses the public realm to reconcile the various desires of the city for continuous, accessible fabric, the developer for property value raising enhancements, and the inhabitant for security and a sense of local community. The project proposes thinking about urban housing development as a part of a larger neighborhood development rather than as an enclave. The design proposal demonstrates the application of this design method in answering to the needs of Chicago and the public realm, development pressures, and most importantly the comfort and quality of life of the inhabitant. The evolution of this more integrated urban housing design is traced and critiqued under various applications ranging from publicly-developed low-income to privately-developed upper income housing. The housing is evaluated according to its success first from a quality of life standpoint for its inhabitants, and second according to its integration and affects on the surrounding urban fabric. The basis of this range being that the argument revolves on establishing housing which can answer to the needs of the public realm and satisfy the basic needs of an inhabitant, in all income levels. This analysis of models and applications leads to a method, or rather standards in the success rate and feasibility of a housing development. The public realm is the next item critiqued to establish similar models of success. The result is a list of standards which a development must respond to, to satisfy both the needs of the city, and of its inhabitants. The comprehensive approach becomes the next step in the evolution. An SO-acre plot of Chicago's waterfront, where current housing and commercial development is occurring, is the test site for the comprehensive approach. The same standards by which the other housing was critiqued will be applied both at a city-wide level and a housing level. A master-plan is provided for growth on the SO-acre site including the general scope of the housing needs and requirements. The housing is then fully developed and explored on both the urban and architectural level.
From the Introduction: Consider these two places: Walking into Green Acres, you immediately sense that you have entered an oasis-traffic noise left behind, negative urban distractions out of sight, children playing and running on the grass, adults puttering on plant-filled balconies. Signs of life and care for the environment abound. Innumerable social and physical clues communicate to visitors and residents alike a sense of home and neighborhood. This is a place that people are proud of, a place that children will remember in later years with nostalgia and affection, a place that just feels "good." Contrast this with Southside Village. Something does not feel quite right. It is hard to find your way about, to discern which are the fronts and which are the backs of the houses, to determine what is "inside" and what is "outside." Strangers cut across what might be a communal backyard. There are no signs of personalization around doors or on balconies. Few children are around; those who are outside ride their bikes in circles in the parking lot There are few signs of caring; litter, graffiti, and broken light fixtures indicate the opposite. There is no sense of place; it is somewhere to move away from, not somewhere to remember with pride. These are not real locations, but we have all seen places like them. The purpose of this book is to assist in the creation of more places like Green Acres and to aid in the rehabilitation of the many Southside Villages that scar our cities. This book is a collection of guidelines for the site design of low-rise, high-density family housing. It is intended as a reference tool, primarily for housing designers and planners, but also for developers, housing authorities, citizens' groups, and tenants' organizations-anyone involved in planning or rehabilitating housing. It provides guidelines for the layout of buildings, open spaces, community facilities, play areas, walkways, and the myriad components that make up a housing site.
A novel and interdisciplinary perspective on post-war church building In the 1950s and 1960s, thousands of churches were built across Europe in an attempt to keep up with the continent's rapid urbanisation. This book addresses the immense effort related to the planning, financing, and construction of this new religious infrastructure. Going beyond aspects of style and liturgy, and transcending a focus on particular architects or regions, this volume considers church building at the crossroads of pastoral theology, religious sociology, and urban planning. Presenting the rich palette of strategies and methods deployed by congregations, dioceses, government bodies, and private patrons in their attempt to secure a religious presence in the rapidly modernising world, Territories of Faith offers a broad view of the practice of religion and its material expression in the fast-evolving (sub)urban landscapes of post-war Europe.
An updated reference source providing easy access to the design, building, financing and management of multi-family housing. Dissects housing into its various components: architectural, structural, mechanical, electrical, behavioral and financial. Synthesizes all factors through the design methodology of high, low, and midrise prototypes. Includes important coverage of housing for the elderly and the handicapped; energy conservation; pre-cast and pre-stressed techniques and context sensitivity. Features 87 outstanding projects illustrated with photos, plans, site plans and cost data; extensive bibliography and over 600 illustrations.
