32-storey glazed tower, arthouse cinema and ice rink are part of a preliminary proposal by developer Seán Dunne for a high-rise residential, commercial and cultural development on the Jurys and Berkeley Court hotel sites in Ballsbridge, Dublin.
In a private meeting on Tuesday night, Mr Dunne's team briefed public representatives and local councillors on the nine-block development proposed for the seven-acre site which he acquired for €380 million last year.
Designed by Danish architects Henning Larsen, as well as the tower on Pembroke Road, there would be 632 residential units, a hotel and a 3,000 sq metre shopping area with glass pyramids that would allow light to penetrate to an underground retail mall. Cultural uses suggested include a small theatre which would double as a jazz club, an arthouse cinema, a museum and an ice rink. The complex would have an open streetscape with a series of roads and pedestrian walkways.
About 20 per cent of the scheme would be offices and 15 per cent retail. As well as the 32- storey tower, which city architect Jim Barrett, who attended an earlier pre-planning meeting, describes as "a very sculptural tapered piece", there would be a 15- to 18-storey building fronting on to Shelbourne Road.
There would also be a number of 12-storey buildings which would be stepped down to seven storeys on Lansdowne Road and Pembroke Road. The developer, who is refusing to issue details or images of the proposed scheme to the public, will not lodge a formal planning application until March, when the Ballsbridge local area plan is expected to be finalised.
Although he is looking to include offices, that would involve a variation to the development plan as the site is currently zoned Z1 "to protect or improve residential amenity".
The meeting involved a slide show presentation which excluded the media.
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