An international competition to select a design for the new National Theatre (the Abbey) at George's Dock in Dublin's docklands is to be held over the coming months, Minister for Arts, Sport and Tourism Séamus Brennan announced yesterday.
The new waterside building "will give Dublin an iconic and dynamic structure reflecting the city's growing reputation as a global capital of culture and creativity", he said.
"It has to be very special. If we don't get something really good here, we deserve to be shot."
The competition jury includes architects from Ireland, Britain and the Netherlands with previous experience of high-profile design projects as well as eminent figures from the theatrical world, including Abbey director Fiach MacConghail and actress Fiona Shaw.
Seán Benton, chairman of the Office of Public Works (OPW), who will also serve on the jury, said the site for the new theatre included both the dock basin and an adjoining area of land between the first three blocks of the International Financial Services Centre.
It had been intended that a fourth block, known as the Centre Block, would be built at this location, but this plan was abandoned amid some controversy in 1991. Since then, part of the site has been used for a Stonehenge-style circle and the rest planted with trees.
Asked about concerns that the project would consume much of George's Dock, he emphasised it would be open to competitors to propose locating as much as possible of the building's footprint on the land "to avoid encroaching too much on the dock basin".
The Government decided in December 2005 that the new Abbey would be built at George's Dock as a public-private partnership project, after concluding that legal wrangles over the Carlton site on O'Connell Street cast doubt over its availability in the short term.
Although the outstanding legal challenge over the Carlton site's ownership is expected to be resolved and plans to redevelop the property are to be unveiled before Christmas, Mr Brennan's department has stuck with the George's Dock option.
A brief for the project, originally drawn up in 2002, is still being revised and would be available shortly, according to a spokesman for the department. No estimate of the cost of the new theatre has been published, but it is expected to be at least €150 million.
The new Abbey will cover more than 24,000sq m, comprising three theatres, several rehearsal rooms, public foyers, shops, bars, restaurants, cafes, facilities for performers and staff, gallery and exhibition spaces and even a cinema/lecture theatre.
Currently the Abbey provides up to 632 seats in two auditoriums.
"The new building will provide audiences with more choices and a greater opportunity to see more diverse work with plans for some 1,000 seats across three auditoriums," a statement said. It is intended that the public will be given the opportunity to make known their views when a shortlist of submitted designs is put on display ahead of a decision on the final design - though, of course, popular opinion may not necessarily prevail.
"It must be a design that reflects and embraces the great surges in creativity and culture we are witnessing in the Ireland of the 21st century, while at the same time acknowledging the historic significance of the Abbey to Irish life over more than a century," Mr Brennan said.
"I look forward to a new national theatre building that makes a bold and visionary statement about modern Ireland . . . a cultural institution that will act as a magnet to draw all of our citizens, and those visiting, towards enjoying the inspiring drama and creativity our country has to offer."
The Minister said the appointment of the jury and the publication in the coming days of a notice in the EU Official Journal announcing details of the international competition marked significant progress in the development of the new National Theatre.
Others who will serve on the jury are Mr Justice Bryan McMahon, chairman of the Abbey Theatre's board of directors; Pat Cooney, the OPW's principal architect; Jim Barrett, former Dublin city architect; Des McMahon, of Gilroy McMahon, architects of Croke Park; John McLaughlin, director of architecture with the Dublin Docklands Development Authority; Niall Ó Donnchú, assistant secretary, Department of Arts, Sport and Tourism; British architects Sir Michael Hopkins and Ed Jones; Dutch national architect Mels Crouwel; and theatre set designer Bob Crowley.