RIAI | Irish Architecture Awards

Citation

Southern (over €300,000)

This pavilion extension, careful in its materials, appropriate in its design of spaces, elegant in its form, enhances and revitalises the existing and produces a composition both pleasing and functional.

Architects/Client Comments
The design of the Museum extension is informed by the conservation requirement of the objects within. It is intended to create a sustainable environment that may be easily and economically maintained. With this in mind, the building is constructed of solid masonry, exposed internally, using thermal mass to regulate the environmental conditions. In combination with this it was decided to naturally ventilate the building.

To maintain the thermal environment the building could only be insulated externally. A naturally ventilated rainscreen cladding was chosen to form a protective outside layer. Clay tiles are used as a contextual material in Cork particularly of the 18th and 19th Centuries. As a material the clay sits in contrast to the rendered finish of the existing house.

The major space of the Park now lies to the West and is addressed by the columned formal expression of the West façade. As a pavilion within a park the building expresses four elevations allowing it to sit elementally within the space. The main exhibition space, café, and temporary exhibition address the North with large windows. The inner temporary exhibition addresses the East, the entrance, the south and the columns and glass service wall to the West.

The new composition uses the existing building as a complimentary element. Internally the drama of the existing small rooms is offset by the large precise volumes of the new extension.

The new building and its relationship to the existing represents an unconfusing traditional approach to the design of building groups. The composition represents the layered evidence of a living cultural tradition. All rooms in the new building are orientated, located and sized as required without reference to those of the existing building.

The design influences on the project are widespread. It is contextual yet international and proclaims its historical authenticism. In its essence the building is a contemporary response to the care and display of a collection of cultural significance.

The building is also sited along the City’s western corridor, historically itself a place for walking, extending from the city centre, via the Mardyke to the Lee Fields.