Design Challenge and Design Ideas

The clients for this project were three childhood friends from Dublin, who had been looking separately at purchasing city centre accommodation, close to work, without any success, so decided to pool resources and pursue an alternative strategy. They purchased an awkward, unappreciated site, and developed, for themselves, a terrace of three new two-bedroomed, three-storey dwellings.

How the brief was fulfilled

The site constraints were significant, due to the limited site dimensions (less than three metres at its narrowest point), further reduced by the provision of a new pedestrian route along Swan Place.
Each dwelling is different in layout, but with the same floor area and general arrangement, with the living spaces situated on the first floor. The upper level contains private exterior terraces for each dwelling.
Optimising light was a priority. This presented a challenge, given that the southern façade has a series of blank brick niches but no windows, to avoid any potential overlooking of the adjacent development. The building responds in scale and form to the differing conditions on each façade, with a series of rooflights, recesses and projecting bays. The individual stairwells respond to the tapering site, rotating as necessary across the plan. The building has 95% site coverage.
Vehicular parking provision was not considered necessary, either by the client or the local authority, due to the proximity of the site to multiple public transport options.
One significant element in the design is the provision of said new pedestrian route along the Swan Place façade, where previously there was none, as pedestrian access to Swan Place before was via the vehicular laneway itself. The donation of said space to the public realm, notwithstanding the impact of the associated reduction in buildable ground floor area was considered an essential part of the project from the outset.

The individual dwellings are low energy, generally A2 rated, and heating and ventilation via an exhaust air heat pump. The upper and lower roofs have an extensive sedum blanket on the upper roof and individual planters on the small roof to the front, reducing the rate of storm water run-off entering the drainage system and adding biodiversity value. The building envelope is low maintenance with brick and untreated cedar left to weather naturally, reducing operational energy use.
The project is an exercise in brick and cedar, acknowledging both the urban and sylvan context. A visionary client and an exceptional contractor, from inauspicious beginnings, and three new homes in the city.