(Article) Swedish design for Galway Pier Project

Amtmann

SWEDISH ARCHITECTS have won an international competition to design a new centre pier performance space for Galway harbour.
Entitled "The Sky Pier - Unity in Duality", the successful entry was confirmed last night as Galway marked the opening of the city's first Open House architectural festival. The judges described the design by JM - Konrad Milton and Carl Jägnefält - as "creating a compelling architectural image with a linear building along the northern edge of the pier, which then rises vertically to form a tall thin tower at the point where it meets the sea".
"The fact that the stage is powered hydraulically from a pool on the top level of the tower adds to the delight of this scheme," the panel said. The Swedish architects will receive a majority share of the €10,000 prize, while two Galway architects, Laura O'Brien and Faela Guiden, took first place in the student category. Their winning design was described by the judges as a "lucid and evocative response to the site, the brief, and the character of the place".
Royal Institute of Architects of Ireland director John Graby said that the competition "shows a huge, suppressed creativity among architects, which should be used to help shape a better future for the built environment in Ireland".
Galwegians have been invited to cast their own votes on the winning entries, which will be displayed this weekend from noon to 4pm in the Centre Pier building.
More than 100 entries were submitted for the contest to redevelop the Galway harbour centre pier. Competitors were asked to design a building incorporating a public stage, retail space, marina facilities, tourist information kiosk and commercial offices.
The building "should reflect Galway's importance as a maritime and cultural city", the jury said.
Members of the jury included: Galway Harbour Company chief executive Eamon Bradshaw; Galway City Council senior executive architect Sebastian Feldmann; Dublin Docklands Development Authority director of architecture John McLaughlin; Druid Theatre artistic director Garry Hynes, and Marcus Donaghy of Donaghy and Dimond Architects.
Galway's Grammar School, Augustinian Church, Druid Theatre and Western Fisheries Board headquarters are among a series of recently refurbished buildings open to the public this weekend as part of the Open House festival.
The three-day festival is being held in partnership with the Irish Architecture Foundation. Details are on www.openhousegalway.ie

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/ireland/2009/1017/1224256900444.html

Carawaystick

Have there been any plans to do something where the fuel depot was at the north side of the harbour?

KevR

Carawaystick wrote: »

Have there been any plans to do something where the fuel depot was at the north side of the harbour?

Haven't heard of any plans for that yet. They might wait for the property market to pick up and then build apartments there.

Carawaystick

Who owns it now?

It'd be ideal for a proper continental style terace cafe/resteraunt/shop area, facing the west to get the(any) evening sun


Back on topic, no pics yet of the designs?

KevR

Last I heard the oil companies still own that site.

Roryhy

Found a picture on archiseek.

Does this count as infrastructure?....hardly.....but anyway

Roryhy

Is that the outline of a blimp above the structure in the cloud?

Chris_533976

Absolutely disgusting piece of architecture.

serfboard

Chris_533976 wrote: »

Absolutely disgusting piece of architecture.

Hey man, don't you get it? It's cool ... it's iconic ... it's ... absolute sh1te is what it is.

KevR

KevR wrote: »

Last I heard the oil companies still own that site.

I think a property developer bought it as part of a swap - he built new tanks and got the land. There is probably a lot of cleaning up to do to get it habitable. It was supposed to be developed in tandem with the station redevelopment.

Cadiz

I remember landing at Moscow airport in 1992. That horrible thing reminds me very much of the airport building.

?Cee?view

It's not on the site where the Tanks were. It's on the centre pier, near the gates.

Gerry Barrett (Edward Holdings) now owns the site where the tanks were.

I'm not a big fan of modern architecture, but I kind of like this. If you picture it on its site near the front of the harbour, with the tower facing out to sea, I think it's kind of cool. It's low so it wouldn't block views from the town side of landscape beyond.

On the site of the former tanks, it would look sh1te.

I think it would replace a long corrugated iron/galvanised shed that's there now

...just my €0.02

Cadiz

churchview wrote: »

I'm not a big fan of modern architecture, but I kind of like this. If you picture it on its site near the front of the harbour, with the tower facing out to sea, I think it's kind of cool. It's low so it wouldn't block views from the town side of landscape beyond.

On the site of the former tanks, it would look sh1te.

I think it would replace a long corrugated iron/galvanised shed that's there now

...just my €0.02

Ah ok. Well, I could see how it would fit that long narrow stretch better than the tank site alright. What's that brown material going to be made of I wonder, is it metal?

schween

I'm not sure what to make of it, I think I like it.

The lightning, the blimp and the people standing on the edge of the roof with no railings are so strange.

?Cee?view

Probably left over scrap metal from the scrap heap that's opposite

Seriously though, they'd need a material that's very resistant to prevailing Atlantic winds, not one that's nice and artistic in an Architect's office.

?Cee?view

schween wrote: »

The lightning, the blimp and the people standing on the edge of the roof with no railings are so strange.

Agreed, really weird, but to some artsy fartsy types it probably makes sense

KevR

churchview wrote: »

Probably left over scrap metal from the scrap heap that's opposite

Seriously though, they'd need a material that's very resistant to prevailing Atlantic winds, not one that's nice and artistic in an Architect's office.

The tourist office in Salthill is not only resistant to prevailing Atlantic winds but it's "artistic" also.