IF CROKE Park had not won the gold medal of the Royal Institute of the Architects of Ireland (RIAI), President Mary McAleese said, there would have been “82,000 people every week telling you how wrong you’ve got it”.
After presenting the medal to architects Gilroy McMahon yesterday, the President said the jury – headed by former RIAI president Joan O’Connor – could not have chosen “a more popular and iconic building” than the recreated Croke Park.
“In the short few years since its transformation, it has become associated with memories that are utterly historic and miraculous, that we never thought would happen, like the Ireland-England rugby match when the English anthem was played with great respect.”
Most of all, she said, it was a source of “intense and emotional national pride that such a wonderful place could have been aspired to and delivered by an amateur sport and a volunteer organisation” – the GAA – and Gilroy McMahon had “rightly emerged triumphant”.
The President commented on how dramatically times had changed in the world of Irish architecture since she last presented the RIAI gold medal just three years ago to O’Donnell + Tuomey Architects for the “wonderful” Ranelagh Multidenominational School, in Dublin.
The mood was now more sombre because of the economic downturn, which had “taken its toll” among architects in particular, but there was a need to offer inspiration to young architects who were “scared of the future”, she said.
However, changing times should not “paralyse genius”. That was why the gold medal for Croke Park would “ripple out right across the country”, she said.
It was “as good as winning the Triple Crown and Grand Slam because there is such a sense of public pride in that building and in its recreation”.
Architects had managed to turn public spaces into “places that would lift our hearts and give us a sense of pride in our own genius . . . We need to be reminded of those inspirational values in these tougher times and to hold on to those values is extremely important.”
RIAI president Seán Ó Laoire described yesterday’s gold medal for Croke Park – “that great theatre of dreams” – as a celebration of what could be achieved in the public realm “against background of confusion, hopelessness and lack of direction”.
Joan O’Connor on behalf of the jury described the redeveloped stadium as “a landmark in the architectural, historical and cultural landscape of Dublin” that related well to its environment while being “an elaborate but delicate signature on the city’s skyline”.
Architect Des McMahon, who previously won a Gold Medal for his extension to the Dublin Institute of Technology in Bolton Street, said Croke Park had “rewritten the rules for stadium design” in an inner city context, creating a “communal intimacy for spectators”. It had also helped to reaffirm the GAA’s cultural importance.
“It is a tribute to the confidence and cultural values of the GAA who, through their generosity in sharing the venue with all sports, have engendered a sense of national ownership and pride,” he said.
Two other architectural practices received commendations from the judging panel – ABK Architects for Áras an Chontae, Offaly County Council’s new civic offices in Tullamore, and de Paor Architects for a utility building, or pumphouse, on the seafront at Clontarf, Dublin.
Others on the Gold Medal shortlist were Grafton Architects, who won the World Building of the Year award last October for a new university building in Milan; FKL Architects (for Baldoyle Library) and McCullough Mulvin/ KMD Architecture for the Ussher Library in TCD.
The medal, awarded since 1934, is the highest honour in Irish architecture given to a building of exceptional merit.
The awards are held three to five years after completion so buildings can be judged in a mature state. The period for this year’s award was 2001 to 2003.