The strains of a string quartet and the presence of the ail Taoiseach marked the official opening of the third extension to the Law Library yesterday.
The 163,000 sq ft building, on the site of the Irish Distillers warehouse in Church Street, Dublin, is by far the biggest of these. The first was the extension of the Law Library in the Four Courts itself, and it was succeeded by a new building nearby in Church Street, which opened a few years ago.
The latest, £20 million building is only yards away and close to St Michan's Church. It houses not only a library and general seating area, as well as rooms for 175 barristers, but a legal research centre and 20 purpose-built arbitration rooms.
Much of the original stonework of the old warehouse has been retained.
The Chief Justice, Mr Justice Liam Hamilton, made a direct appeal to the Taoiseach, Mr Ahern, at the opening ceremony to use all his influence to bring about the building of a Supreme Court building with adequate facilities and resources.
In the two new buildings, rooms are usually grouped in twos and threes, and barristers share a secretary/receptionist. They then have the privacy of an office, as well as access to a centralised library.
Before the two new extensions were built overcrowding in the Law Library had already forced a number of barristers, especially the more successful, to rent office space in the area of the Four Courts.
This marked a move of the Irish Bar towards a system closer to the chambers system in the English Bar, where barristers work in groups.
The facilities in the new buildings differ from the English system in that Irish barristers will continue to meet together in communal areas like the Law Library and the communal facilities in the new buildings, and - according to Mr John MacMenamin, chairman of the Bar Council - share both research facilities and expertise.