Home > Journal > Issue Nine > Ballymun Regeneration Housing Competition 1999

Ballymun Regeneration Housing Competition 1999 - Grace Keeley and Michael Pike

The intention is to create an open system for the development of the site rather than an architectural composition complete in itself. A dynamic process, open in form and time is proposed, substituting a closed idea of composition for an open mechanism capable of favouring varied combinations and different formal manifestations. A framework that can adapt to and develop through future dialogue with prospective residents and developers.

A landscape of parallel walls cross the entire site at 4m centres, making a new series of habitable allotments for the new main street. These form the basis for a dense carpet of housing.

These are then cut by two new streets and by a new pedestrian space that links Silloge Gardens to Main Street and connects the two parts of the site.

A new landscape is created between the walls, a dense tapestry of one and two storey housing interspersed with private and semi-private courtyards and gardens.

Public space is reduced to a minimum in favour of maximising private space. The parking is all dealt with directly off the two streets, either in private front gardens or in small shared courts.

Facing onto Main Street and the car-park to the north are a series of shop/workshop units with two storeys of housing above.

All the units have their own front door and have private open space. There are no lifts. The intention is to break down the distinctions that have existed in areas such as Ballymun between the flats and the houses - a new sense of security and social cohesion can develop from the proximity of everyone to the ground.

In order to ensure a degree of uniformity and identity the materials would be carefully prescribed. The ground floor would be in brick forming a plinth, with plaster and timber for the upper storeys.