Architects working for Fingal County Council have had an impressive decade during which they have lovingly restored many of the county's libraries – which are now seeing record use, writes EMMA CULLINAN
THE STONE walls of the old church in Rush may have once protected the faithful from biting coastal winds, but they couldn’t save the building, which was replaced by a new church build alongside it in the early 1980s.
That left an empty building, which then became an arts centre, and was later taken over by Fingal County Council, which saved it from decay and renewed it as a library (pictured far right middle). The newly completed library is the latest in a series of renovations of old buildings by the council. Conservation is at the top of the agenda for Fingal’s architects. “We are not just winging it,” says Fionnuala May, the council’s senior architect.
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Rush library’s architects, McCullough Mulvin, were struck by the building’s position among the vegetable plots by the sea – the sense of growth and sustenance that these conjure up concurs with architect Niall McCullough’s observation that, “the idea of a library is partly about forming a compendium of human knowledge to defeat death and make an attempt at immortality”.
Rush library will open as soon as the paper work has been ironed out. The opening can’t come soon enough for the more than 300 people who attended an open day in December.
The architects have inserted a large, sculptural walnut structure in the nave which incorporates lecture rooms, shelving, desks, walkways and stairs. While this forms the heart of the new design, it respects the original structure – enabling the old form to be read – and is removable.
“We kept the structure away from the walls – and the new part is clearly separate from the old,” says McCullough. “If people wanted the original volume, they could have it all back within a week.”
Fingal council officials were pleased with the number of people who came to the open day, but were not surprised because large crowds also came to the opening of the Blanchardstown library 10 years earlier. In that decade, Fingal has revived many of its old libraries, restoring handsome buildings and in some instances adding modern architectural features. Much of the impetus behind all of this came from recently retired county librarian Paul Harris and the then county architect and now county manager, David O’Connor.
They saw that as library services moved beyond book-lending to include internet access and meeting and exhibition spaces, the old buildings needed to expand.
In the past decade, the council also moved from Dublin city centre to two new local area offices: the fine building in Swords by architects Bucholz McEvoy and a new civic centre in Blanchardstown, which also houses the Draíocht Arts Centre and a library, all designed by Fingal council architects.
“On the day it opened there was a queue waiting to get in,” says May. “There was nothing civic or municipal in Blanchardstown then, just the shopping centre. The library offered a hugely expanded service and was a roaring success from the beginning.”
The next library to open in Fingal, in 2004, was the converted and extended barracks building overlooking the sea in Baldoyle (pictured far right bottom). “After Blanchardstown, we said, ‘we’ve got this one, let’s do the next one’,” says May. “There was never a fear that they weren’t going to work.” Just as David O’Connor had commissioned a young architectural practice, Bucholz McEvoy, to design the Swords offices, he was to repeat this with the new architectural practice of FKL. Such commissioning of young practices, incidentally, would be difficult today under new procurement rules.
The neat building of pale granite, concrete and timber, houses a library, a meeting room and an exhibition space. “It’s a lovely building: essentially a little cube folded around the existing library,” says May. “The room we have council meetings in has a fantastic view over the bay. The exhibition space on the corner with two glass walls is booked up for a year in advance.”
IN 2006, TOupgrade Balbriggan library, Fingal Council did a land-swap and the design project was undertaken by Ashlin Coleman architects. The new extension picks up on the original building's red Portmarnock brick with limestone dressings.
The old building, a 1905 Carnegie library, is in the Scottish baronial style with a circular turret on its corner. Carnegie libraries were built in many English-speaking countries with money provided by the Scottish-born, US-raised steel magnate Andrew Carnegie, who became a philanthropist in later life. Quite a number of these libraries were built in Ireland.
While the booming economy enabled many of these Fingal library projects to proceed, the economic recession has brought ambitious plans for the improvement of others to a shuddering halt.
There were plans to extend the library in Howth, in partnership with a developer, but this is not now going to happen. “We also want to upgrade the library in Swords and the lovely Carnegie library in Skerries,” but these too are now on hold, says May.
Another Carnegie library restored during the boom is in Malahide (pictured above). This Dutch-gabled, redbrick building is typical of Carnegie libraries, which tended to have elaborate facades and utilitarian interiors without elaborate details. This made their interiors relatively easy to convert. The renovation of Malahide library, in 2007, included a new extension, designed by council architects, with a curved roof feature.
Next to be revamped was Garristown library, also a Carnegie building, dating from 1910 (pictured top right). Prior to its restoration, this church-like limestone structure used to be open only for a few hours each week. There was no heating or bathrooms (if the librarian needed to use one, she had to put up a sign and nip home). “The building had deteriorated and was very damp,” says May. Fingal architects also designed a new annex with a zinc roof, which references some farm buildings in the area.
Conservation is also about change, says May. “Sometimes on conservation projects you have to make a decision about rectifying something that was always trouble and change the detail. The roof took a lot of work: a small oculus on the front had disintegrated and birds had colonised a section of roof space. We filled a skip with huge bits of metal and bed springs that the birds had brought in.” Garristown library is now open for 50 hours a week and has finally “come into its own”, says May.
The library in Rush has also now been completed. “McCullough Mulvin had done other libraries and have a marvellous feel for working with old and new together and are not afraid to make a radical intervention,” she says.
Niall McCullough says each building should be considered on its own merits and we should not not zealously conserve everything, nor necessarily add on sleek new forms. “Not all buildings are precious,” he says, “you have to make an assessment on a building-by-building basis.” McCullough chose to keep the exterior – giving the building a certain mystery as to its use. “It is not immediately obvious, but people here know it’s a library.” Clues include a book motif on a gable wall – in place of a cross that fell off – and a lantern, suggesting lighthouses and bright ideas garnered through reading.
Rush library did provide one major shock for McCullough and his architects. Having assessed it as a non-valuable structure, they then discovered a precious 18th-century chapel beneath. McCullough saw the funny side: “When you start that debate about intervention, deciding when to interfere and make changes, it is great when a building bites you back.” Part of the old chapel is now visible through a glass floor near the entrance.
RESTORATION WORKincluded addressing the damp and dry rot, repairing the roof, re-leading windows and painting the interior. Original doors and ironmongery were retained and one of the confessionals has now been turned into a listening booth. The architects put in floor and ceiling insulation and hid services elements and appliances in the roof space.
“We tried to do it as cleanly as possible,” says McCullough. “Historic structures often have great voids in roofs that are not used.”
The economic boom of the past decade enabled the restoration of these libraries, says Fionnuala May, because of the huge new housing and industrial developments in Fingal. “Development levies got shared out for various civic programmes; it didn’t all just go on water and roads.” And the investment in libraries has proved one that has showed good dividends. Because with the recession has come a boom in library use.
“Librarians are reporting incredible usage in all age groups,” she says.