andrew cusack thesis

Re-Interpreting Public Space:Creating Connections

Andrew Cusack10110631

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I would like to thank the support of my family over the last number of years in seeing me through architecture. Without there constant guidance I would not have made it this far and especially to my father for his help in getting me over the finish line in last number of weeks and days

Acknowledgments

Re-interperting Public Space:Creating Connections

Andrew Cusack

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Table of Contents:

Abstract:

Introduction:

Psychogeography and The Situationists:

Ireland’s attitude to Public Space: The Use of Churches:

The work of Pieter Saenredam:

Analytical Study of Limerick’s Churches:

Research of Church Conversions:

Conclusion:

Bibliography:

Endnotes

Site/Intent:

Project Realised:

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Abstract:

In many cities today, public space is mostly considered as thoroughfare, where people only use it as on their way to somewhere else, a job, social meetings, their home. Large sections of society don’t engage with these spaces, or allow themselves time to pause and reflect on being a part of that wider public conneciton. Therefore our enjoyment of the public realm is very limited. The intention of my thesis is to propose how we can create better connection in an urban environment through high quailty interior and exterior Public Space.

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IntroductionThe pleasure in walking

For many years I am increasingly finding pleasure in walking and exploring a city. I find it the best way to experience a new environment. I have been very fortunate to travel to many countries in recent years and immerse myself in new cultures, ways of life and many different types of built urban fabric. When I visit a new city I tend not to get a street map but rather, I tend to trust my intuition to guide me around. As I walk around the city I start to build up a mental map in my head and slowly start to understand the layout of the city. This technique enables me to see the city from a different perspective, rather than just going straight to the main tourist attractions. A time when I put this love for the pleasure of walking into good practice was while having a drink after work one night in Manhattan. A friend proposed we should go to another bar and that we should hail a taxi to get there. I suggested instead of having a definitive destination of where we wanted to go, we would just walk downtown and see what grabbed our attention. Strolling the streets further downtown, you pass many street vendors selling a variety of hotdogs, burgers and drinks for the thousands of burdened office workers too busy to stop

for lunch, retreating quickly back to their glasses encased buildings. I find enjoyment in this kind of rambling and people watching, soaking up the atmosphere of the city. Slowly the buildings change from high rise office blocks to older more elegant buildings that have been converted into modern apartments, trendy bars and restaurants. Shortly after leaving the first bar we found a Korean restaurant and decided we would enjoy some food before continuing. The vibrance and buzz of the restaurant was so enticing that we stayed there for the rest of night chatting to the recently immigrated owners and sharing some Sake with them, trading stories. If it had not been for our decision to walk aimlessly we would never have had that experience, which allowed me to gain a greater understanding of the city and its inhabitants. In my opinion if you only travel to the places everyones goes and take the same photos as everyone else, then you aren't understanding a place fully. You might as well have just looked at Google images. Of course this is a slightly facetious remark because I do believe any kind of travel can hugely benefit everyone, especially architects. The more we experiences new cities and places helps to build a reservoir of knowledge to apply

in our everyday practice. As Rebecca Solnit makes the point in Wanderlust,

“the word citizen has to do with cities, and the ideal city is organised around citizenship— around participation in public life.” 1

So for us to improve our cities we need to be actively involved in what goes on. We need to do more than just the daily relentless commute. One thing that has always been apparent to me throughout my time travelling is in all urban environments there are places of connection and isolation, of attraction and exclusion, of growth and desolation. In all cities there are the main places we go and the places we avoid. If we want to change that we need to engage with all areas of the city. We tend go in very direct paths from point A to B. We need to change this. Most people living in an urban setting once they have lived there for some time, start to become habitualised to the city. They have decided on their set routes through the city for work, socialising and any other activities. They stop exploring the city and think they know it well. But in fact I think you could take anyone no matter how long they have lived in a city and show them

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something new about it weather it be a bar they haven’t been into or a alleyway that has some street art never before seen by them. Solnit makes the point in Wanderlust, In chapter eleven, she opens with a reflection of what it is like to come back to her home city after being away for sometime. It highlights how because she had grown up in San Francisco she could not see why everyone who came there loved it so much. It took her leaving and later returning to see the city with fresh eyes and finally “understand all those country songs about the lure of the bright lights of town” 2

For me the city is a place that you can never fully explore but there is constant pleasure in seeking out new ways through the city and places. This constant ambition to fully understand the city.

Korean Restaurant I came across on my walk

Ambling walk through Manhatten to find a bar

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From these works and writings, Situationist theory began to develop,which revolved around the construction of situations in cities along with the field of psychogeography which was properly defined as above. It was finally in July of 1957 that Debord along with Asger Jorn managed to join some much smaller avant-garde movements such as the London Psychogeographic Association and the International movement for an imaginest bauhaus together with the Letterist international to from the Situationist International. They were opposed to all ideology. In “The society of the spectacle” by Debord he describes ideology as

“ The abstract will to universality” 5

He feels that all ideologies are “repressive delusions.” which to some could be seen as contradictory as they laid out some forms of an ideology in their 1957 manifesto. What they were seeking to do was to attach their ideas to all areas of culture such as art, films, literature and eventually to push many political theories into the main stream ideals. They took inspiration from Marxism and the 20th century artistic avant-garde movement.

logic. From these ideas, Surrealism grew in the 1920’s and was based mostly in Paris. The group was looking to revolutionise human experience by making them free of restrictive customs and structures. In the early 1940’s Isidore Isou took some of the theoretical ideas from both the Dada and Surrealism movements to form Lettrism. The group published many works over the subsequent years ranging from poetry to large literary texts. One of the members was Guy Debord who joined in 1951. After meeting with the group in Cannes he decided to spilt and form his own group the Letterist International. This group did not have much in common with the former and was much more a precursor to the Situationists. It was here that the beginnings of Debord’s ideas on Psychogeography were to be honed and developed. During this period Debord wrote his “Theory of the dérive” and Ivan Chtcheglov, a political theorist wrote his work “Formulary for new Urbanism”. In this Chtcheglov pushed for a new city were

“ Everyone will live in their own personal cathedral. There will be rooms more conducive to dreams than any drug, and houses where one cannot help but love.” 4

Psychogeography and The Situationists A Brief History

Psychogeography can be defined as

“ the study of the specific effects of the geographical environment, consciously organised or not, on the

emotions and behaviour of individuals. ” 3

Psychogeography is a concept that I became interested in a number of years ago when I began exploring my interest in

movement through the city. I was first drawn to the Situationist movement of the 1950’s and 60’s. I began to look at how they were formed and the thinking behind what they

were writing. The origins of this topic can be found as far back as the 1700’s. Its development can be attributed to many novelists, poets and theorists through the following centuries with the work of Daniel Dafoe and William Blake to Thomas de Quincey and Robert Louis Stevenson, In the early 20th century many new artistic group emerged. Two of these avant-garde movements were Dadaism and later Surrealism. Dadaism emerged as a response to World War One. They believed that it was the colonialists interests which caused the war. Their response was through the visual arts, literature, poetry, manifestoes and art theory. The Dadaism movement embraced chaos and irrationality, rejecting

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these ideas and thinkings. I consider interest in such topics is starting to influence a new generation of younger architects in their thinking and design practice. For me the writing and thinking of the SI have influenced my thought process about how we inhabit our cities greatly. I have tried to use some of their techniques in my own travels of cities around the world to help gain a better understanding of these places.One of the key aspects I enjoy about the SI is Dérive which I think is an answer to help overcome the banalities and habitualiation of a modern city. Dérive as it has now come to be defined as

“ an unplanned journey through a landscape, usually urban, on which the subtle aesthetic contours of the surrounding architecture and geography subconsciously direct the traveler, with the ultimate goal of encountering an entirely new and authentic experience. ”

By taking a random route through the city with no intention of your destination you are able to visit and see things that you might have ignored previously. It is a great way to become much more involved in the city and something I have put into practice many times.

They were very opposed to capitalism and were much more concerned with human desires and how best to fulfil these. The main idea of their work was the construction of situations which would help to favourably increase the fulfilment of the human being. They took many walks through the streets of Pariswand tried as best they possibly could to document the life of the streets and movements of the people within them. From this they created many maps and drawings some are shown below. They tried to capture the life of the city to better understand it These ideas and theories are part of a much larger scale of time where people such as Thomas de Quincy with his work entailed “Confessions Of An English Opium Eater”. In which he outlines and describes many of his trips he took while on opium, around London in the 18th century. In this he makes light of the possibility of chance in this new found London. The idea of Psychogeography became more mainstream and caught the publics attention in the 1960’s and 70’s with the Situationist movement in France. It was Guy Debord who took these ideas and spurred them onto a broader audience. In recent times there has been a revival in

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“ Guide Psychogeographique De Paris, Discours sur les passions de l’amour.” (1957)

This map was created by Guy Debord outling the main hubs of Paris as he and his collegues experianced while taking many strolls through the city and seeking to map how they moved between them.

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of our public sphere. I would say nearly all Irish social occasions have either a relationship to the church or the pub, weather it be a birth, funeral, wedding, job promotion, all of these happen in these places and often one after the other. There are number of reasons why these are the places we associate as public which comes from a long history of relationship with the Catholic Church and storytelling in bars. It has become part of our heritage and culture. These ideas stem from our history which is routed in the rural community where everyone would know each other and be familiar with one another. As our cities have grown larger we have continued this rural mentality and therefore have not pressed for large public squares but rather have been content with going to Mass on a Sunday and meeting our neighbours and going to our local pub for a few drinks with friends. The weather is also a contributing factor as to why we tend to shy away from large scale public plazas. These very vibrant and smaller social indoor gatherings are better adapted to our more inclement weather conditions, unlike our European neighbours who benefit from long periods of sunshine

Ireland’s attitude to Public Space

Why is it that in Ireland we seem to have a lack of interest around the importance of public space?

It is something that we seriously under estimate and consider not of huge value to society. That is the position I think a lot of architects would take about the Irish people and their thinking towards it. This view of Irish public space is possibly a little narrow-minded. Many architects when asked to consider designing public space, tend to imagine large scale interventions and planning that will radically change a city. While this is needed in some cases and is a worthy pursuit, large scale urban masterplans are not something we as a country are familiar with. We as a people tend to be very sceptical of what we don’t understand or relate to. Grand squares such as Saint Marks in Venice is an idea we have imported into the country as a way to make up for a supposed lack of public space. We do in fact construct public space quite well, although it might not be in the wider European sense of public space. What Irish people do very well are pubs, churches and small spaces that often feel inviting and warm. They come with a sense of publicness that I think comes from our own nature as a people. Although if you were to ask many people I don't think they would call their local pub public space. However looking at it from an architectural perspective I see it as very much at the centre

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In the adjecent photographs we identify much more readily with the image on the bottom rather than the one on the top. We are at home on the bottom where as we would feel like tourists roaming through this large open plaza, Taking Temple Bar as an example of good designing of public space in Ireland which has worked very well over the years. There is a scale to the design which could relate in some part to our own more rural beginnings of small towns and villages accross the Irish landscape. For me there is a balance to be found between the more European view of public space and our own Irish way of having small places of gathering. We can have both but we need to understand what we as a society in Ireland wants from our cities.

Public square in Siena

Nancy Blakes pub in Limerick City

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Drawing from mccullough mulvin architects who describe the project of temple bar as follows

“ the plan sought to rehabilitate a run-down area of central Dublin, left derelict by site assembly policies for a new bus station, by promoting a network of urban spaces with cultural and residential uses. The project required the retention of existing fabric and the use of vacant sites for building or urban space, creating links which supported east-west pedestrian movement from Trinity College to Christchurch Cathedral. The competition was won by Group 91, who provided a clear sequence of urban spaces”

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activities rely on the above activities being of good quality and planning. 6

As shown in the adjacent table along with these descriptions of what activities happen in public space Gehl, believed that if you designed good space then the amount of use would increase which would lead to a happier and more engaged public. As people use the space this would attract more and possibly lead to a snow ball effect. What we need to begin to do in Ireland is re-examine how we navigate through our cities. Instead of treating roads and pavements as just routes from point A to B without much thought for the in-between. We should focus on creating a series of networks that roam across the city, that ask for our engagement and encourage a more curious view of our public space. If we can develop an infrastructure that could be rolled out across all cities that would act as a basic framework in which multiple activities can emerge from. It would provide the backbone of our public space.

Jan Gehl describes in “Life in-between buildings” that there are threwe types of social activity

Necessary activities,

Those are ones which are pretty much compulsory- going to school or work,waiting for a bus, shopping. These are only slightly influenced by the physical framework and under all conditions. Optional activities,

Pursuits which people wish to participate in and if time make possible e.g. walking for fresh air. Their influenced heavily by physical conditions and the weather conditions if outdoor areas are of poor quality only strictly necessary activities occur there. When outdoor spaces are of high quality activities take place at the same frequency but take longer as the physical conditions are better and the range of activities will grow and develop.

Social activities, These are the space that rely on the presence of others in public space to allow interaction between people. These social

Table from “Life in-betweeen Buildings”

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centuries these buildings began to expand and become much grander in their scale and ornamentation. They became much more scared spaces in which non- secular activities were discouraged. But this was something that was hard to enforce and many other forms of life continued to be played out in these early churches. Many of these early churches in the early third and fourth centuries had three main uses that of incubation, Sanctuary and shelter for travellers. In these times it was not considered improper to sleep in these places of worship if there was no where else. So from early times there was evidence of eating and sleeping in these holy places which would be considered secular activities. There is evidence to believe that

“ eucharist as first celebrated in the apostolic age was a repetition of the last supper in toto” 7

So that there was a full meal taking place in the church among the congregation. Over time this meal or agape took place more in the private homes of christians as a form of charity towards poorer members of the community.

Ecclesiae” in multi storyed housing blocks began. They were called “Tituli”. Many of these buildings were converted into churches and basilicas which are still standing today and we can see the original foundations of these early buildings. The term basilica has been noted as referring initially to a large meeting hall, reflecting the community that began using these spaces. The Kirk-Bizzeh is another example of a house which was adopted for use as a community building. The plan of this building is a series of small spaces that can allow Mass to be said along with some rooms for teaching and meetings to take place. Over the next couple of

The Use of Churches Secular use as Public Rooms

Churches also play an important role in our understanding of public space especially in Ireland where the church has had such an important place in society for hundreds of years. Churches have always been very social places and have evolved over time. Many churches are like an extention to the street. They can be seen as public spaces attached to the street. From the early days of christians they did not automatically start to build large places of worship to God, but in fact started from much humbler beginnings. The small numbers of people tended to meet in peoples houses and use them for prayer. As the membership grew some houses were acquired either by donation or purchase from collective funds. This shows that from the start there has been a relationship of the church to the domestic and community scale of things. Some houses were altered slightly to allow for larger congregations of 50 people, but the character of the house would remain intact such as with Dura Europos, around 231AD in modern day Syria. For many years what was commonly used were these house-churches. In the third century as numbers increased the construction of “Domus Church at Dura-Europos c. 3rd Century

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studying this cathedral we started to treat it differently. At first we were very respectful of the church and how we acted in it was very reserved, we treated it very much how you would any religious building. But over the coming days we started to see it less as a religious building but more as a public space where we could relax a little more. This was in part due to the fact that the cathedral is not used very often for Mass but much more as tourist attraction. I thought this transition from a very strict to a much looser space was very intriguing and an insight I found into how Irish people might think about treating public space. These church constructs from their early beginnings were once the hub of all social activity in a built up area. They provided food, sanctuary, worship, government, news, shops, council, debate, discussions, drama, dancing, music and a variety of other uses. I believe that even if you remove the more strict religious aspect of the church it is still a place that has a huge resonance and place within a community. We can start to use these buildings in ways which are not new in a historical sense but could highly increase our engagement with them and their benefit to the city.

In the middle ages dancing became more common, in two forms, first the dancing sanctioned by the church on certain feast days and the ones which took place in certain localities depending on local traditions. Another use of these early churches was the sale of goods within them, although there is not huge references to it happening there are some. Again during the middle ages this became more popular with many vendors and sellers operating in the nave of the church in case of bad weather. Many secular meetings tended to take place in these churches, such as elections and discussions as well as legal proceedings. The church has had a varied connection with these secular uses over many centuries. As the centuries progressed we have tended to segregate these different activities out more and more into their own purpose built structures. I wonder is there a way to continue to use these churches in the more mixed use way in which they were first conceived. From a recent trip to Amiens cathedral in France, I have begun to look at churches in a different way. I noticed how over the course of the four days we spent

Banquets were held in these holy places on the days of remembering martyrs and saints. In conjunction with these meals often they would be accompanied with some dancing.

House Church at Kirk-Bizzeh, Syria, c.330

Suvodol, Macedonia, 4th century

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Photo takien by me in Amiens Catherdal

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Photos takien by me in Amiens Catherdal

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“According to his contemporary and biographer Cornelis de Bie, In 1628, the year that Ampzing’s book was published that Saenredam decided to devote the rest of his life to painting ‘perspectives’.” 8

He went on to develop this interest in architecture and the perspective style by working with many painters and architects of the time such as Pieter Post (1608-1669) and Salmon de bray (1597-1664) The first perspective church interior signed and dated by Saenredam is “The transept and part of the choir of the St Bavokerk in Haarlem from north to south.” The manner in which he constructed these paintings is what set him apart from many of his contemporary in a well established genre. Rather than paint imaginary architecture he painted not by obersrvation but by careful measurement of the interiors. Saenredam usually would begin his studies with one large overall drawing and then start to focus on particular views of the church, in-between these taking measurements, drawing details and ground plans. Over the course of the next number of years he would extensively draw the churches in Harrlem and in the surrounding towns and cities. Possibly his most

As he progressed on through 1627-1630 he began working for the Harrlem municipal printer Adriaen Roman, to produce design drawings of the area which were published mostly as loose prints. The young Dutch painter was later asked to contribute illustrations for a book describing and praising the city of Haarlem by Samuel Ampzing. In this book Saenredam provided two compositions one of “The the nave St Bavokerk from west to east” and “The town hall of Haarlem.” However both of these works are unsigned and undated. But many art historians have attributed these works to Saenredam.

The work of Pieter SaenredamAn excursus on the dutch painter

Pieter Janz Saenredam was the son of an engraver born in 1597. As a young boy he moved to the city of Haarlem at age 10 after his father died.This city would serve as his home base for the remainder of his life. where he would produce many of his great works after trips to nearby areas. In 1612 at the age of fifteen he began his an apprenticeship under the history and portrait painter Frans Peters. de Grebber (1573-1649) He resided in De grabber’s workshop until 1622. During this period Saenredam’s early work was mainly focused around simple drawings of flowers, vegetables and fruits shown below.

Early sketch by Saenredam

Early sketch by Saenredam

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that there religious quality overpowering. Two paintings which I think contrast very well together are “The window on the west side of the south aisle of the Mariakerk in Utrecht” and “The nave and choir of the Mariakerke in Utrecht seen to the east”. In the latter painting is describes a large public room in which people are free to roam. In contrast to this then you have the window and aisle describing a smaller more intimate space which one could have a more private meeting. I think these two painting can describe how we as architects can create a series a public rooms within the city. Along with this much of the time Saenredam does not include very many people, certainly not any huge congregations attending a Mass or service. I think this is what attracts me to his work, the fact that they represent how the church is the majority of the time a large empty space that people are free to roam around in, often as an escape from the rest of the city. At the time when many of these were built, cities would have been very dirty dense places and this would allow a reprieve from that intensity.

productive period came in the Autumn of 1636 where he spent 20 consecutive weeks in Utrecht. His work is so carefully dated during this time that you can trace every step of his sojourn through the city. While Saenredam made very detailed construction drawings of these churches when it came to the composition of the painting often some of these details were left out such as the tie rods and other conspicuous components. This resulted in a much more monumental composition of the church. This way of painting I believe allows the quality of these in these interiors to truly come alive and create such exceptional works. Many of the churches interiors which he painted were reformed Protestant churches that have had most decoration and iconography removed, this along with the oblique nature of the perspective helps emphasis the internal space and the volume of it. One aspect of Saenredam’s work that attracted me to it was the fact that the paintings had a quality to them of public space. They did not feel like strict religious spaces but that you could roam around freely in them and use them how you saw fit. The quality of the space is something that he especially captures very well, although they are very clearly church buildings I do not find

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“The transept and part of the choir of the St Bavokerk in Haarlem from north to south.”

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“The window on the west side of the south aisle of the Mariakerk in Utrecht”

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“The nave and choir of the Mariakerke in Utrecht seen to the east”

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Analytical Study of Limerick’s Churches

Limerick, my home city is a place that I am very familiar with. Having grown up here I have a good knowledge of the city but it is still a place that often surprises me with new hidden areas. One of these is that Limerick has an abundance is Churches and pubs. After studying Amiens cathedral, I wanted to focus my thoughts and ideas of public space around the church. How could you begin to navigate the city through these spaces. I began to look at Limerick and the number of religious buildings in the city centre and surrounding suburbs, about 32 between Roman Catholic, Protestant and other Faiths. A image on the next page shows all the religious buildings within the city centre and how numerous they are. There would have been a need for this number of buildings in the past and they would have been heavily used, but are now many are largely empty due to falling attendee numbers and the cost of up keep. In the last 10 years some of these churches in particular have started to close and are no longer accessible. Even amongst many of the churches currently still in use, they only open their doors when Mass is celebrated, in-between that they are mostly locked up. This I feel is an utter waste of good quality space that

could contribute much more to the city. The community that is involved with the mainly Roman Catholic churches in Limerick are unusual in some ways due to the fact that many people attend more than one church. Rather than sticking loyalty to one place, people tend to move around churches depending on the Mass times and when they want to go. This means that the users of these place have a connection to far more than one building, which I believe creates strong ties within the city.

Nolli plan of room completed in 1736

Comparisons can be drawn from the Nolli plan of Rome shown below. It shows the public space inbetween the building and interesting counts the churches among this public space. Hinting to us that there has always been this long history between the space of the church and the public realm.

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Nolli plan of Limerick showing the churches as public space

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Limerick Churches: Survey Drawings St Micheals Church, Denmark Street

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Jesuits Church, 59 O’Connell Street

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Fransicans Church, Henry Street

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Baptist Church, Old Cratloe Rd

Abundant Life Christian Church, Post Office Lane

Jehovah’s Witnesses, 23 Lower Gerald Griffin Street

Deconsecrated Churches

The Red Church, Henry Street

Franciscans, Henry Street

St John’s Church, John’s Square

St Munchin’s Church, Castle Rd

Islamic

Masjid Al Noor, 17 John’s Street

Roman Catholic

St Johns Cathedral, Cathedral place

Redemptorists, South Circular Rd

Augustinians, O’Connell Street

St Joseph’s, O’Connell Avenue

Jesuits Church, The Crescent, O’Connell Street

St Mary's Church, Athlankard Street

Our Lady of the Rosary, Ennis Rd

Dominicans Church, Baker Place, Glenthworth Street

Our Lady Queen of Peace, Roxbrough Rd

Christ the King, Blackthorn Drive, Caherdavin Heights

St Micheals, Denmark St

Our Lady Help of Christians, Plassey Park Rd, Castletroy

Mary Megdalane Church, Monaleen Rd, Castletroy

St Lelias, Kileely Rd, Kileely

Our Lady of Lourdes, Childers Rd

St Nicholas, Westbury, Corbally St Pauls, St Nessan's Rd, Dooradoyle

Corpus Christi Church, Moyross

St Munchin’s, Clancy Strand

Holy Family Church, Donough O'Malley Park

St Brigid’s, St Patrick’s Rd

Church of Ireland

St Mary’s Cathedral, Bridge Street

St Micheals, 2 Barrington Street

Other Christian Denominations

Christ Church Untied Presbyterian and Methodist, 51 O’Connell Street

Churches in Limerick

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Research on Church Conversions

For my research into the new role that the churches of Limerick could have in helping to better connect the city, I have studied a number of projects that have tried to achieve this. The aim of my thesis is quite different to the challenges that these architects were trying to answer. What I want to create is an infrastructure that would run through the city and create new public space within the existing. This new infrastructure would not give a specific function to a space but rather facilitate many number of options so that how the public space is used can still be determined by the average pedestrian. Thus the reason for studying the buildings below is not to make a copy or a pastiche of what has come before, but rather to learn from it and use it to determine a new way of thinking about churches, public/urban space and the role of the flâneur among it all.

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The Garden Museum DowJones Architects London

In November 2007 the architects won an invited competition to redevelop the Garden Museum in London. The completed project opened to the public in November 2008 to great critical acclaim. The Garden Museum is housed in a listed former church where they designed a two- storey structure that wraps around the aisles of the existing building. The new structure creates new galleries for the permanent collection and for temporary exhibitions, and an education room. By creating this new structure within the church is opened up the nave of the church which was previously filled with the exhibitions. This has allowed the museum’s diverse cultural programme of lectures, debates and seminars to take place alongside the exhibitions in the main space. The structure is made from Eurban, a pre-fabricated structural timber material. Being pre-fabricated and made of large panels it is very quick to build with. The museum was closed for 12 weeks whilst the work took place, and of this time the structure took three weeks to assemble.

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Pious Schools Cultural CenterLavapies Escuelas Pias Jose IgnacioMadrid

This project which took place from 1996-2004 consisted of a series of restoration, renovation and new build of a church in Madrid which had been destroyed by fire during the civil war and then fell into neglect over the following 60 years. The aim of the project was to provide a new lecture space, classrooms and a library while renovating the public space outside. The challenge with this project was in creating a cohesiveness between the old church and the new building. What I find interesting about this project is that the church is located within an existing block and the constraints that imposes. The project manages to create a space that connects very much back to the city reflecting its history and future in one and reaching outwards through the new public space.

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MACHmit! The Museum for ChildrenKlaus Block ArchitectsBerlin

The Elias church in Senefelderstraße in Prenzlauer Berg was previously owned by a local Evangelical group which was taken over by the museum in 2003. The brief was to create a child friendly environment in the formally deprived area of Helmholtzplatz. This space was designed to encourage the self learning of the children and provide them with an area that they could freely explore and discover its contents while being educational. In the main exhibition space, which includes two floors and the former church tower, there are the permanent exhibition areas such as a museum printing, shop, hall of mirrors, a stage with seating for about a hundred visitors and the family café which can accommodate two to three temporary exhibitions per year

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The origin of my thesis stems from my own interest in the public life of cities and how we tend to navigate through these spaces. There has always been a desire from the people within cities to have social space where they can congregate and meet, or sometimes just be alone in a crowd. As our cities continue to become denser and more populous places, these public rooms are becoming of ever increasing importance.

To understand how a cities flows and to try understand it, is best done through walking. By navigating the city at leisure you are always bound to come across new parts or places that you have not seen before.

The church in the city has always played a role in this public life from its early beginnings centuries ago. From exploring the history of church use from the early ages through to modern day there is a clear precedent in it being used as a public secular space, by where people came to sleep there after pilgrimages or used it to hold public courts and meals which were for the benefit of everyone within the city.Over the past fifty years in Ireland there has been a steady decline in the congregations attending masses and services, A trend

which is only due to continue. It is our responsibility as architects to ensure that these churches are re purposed in a way that maintains there public presence for future generations to use rather than them being converted into private office blocks or being demolished altogether. I believe we as architects also have a duty of care to provide the best possible social space within a city so that the daily life of the individual is enhanced and the ad-hoc and coincidental nature of the city can flourish.

Along with the church which I see as a interior public room, the condition of the exterior must also be addressed and improved. A combination of these spaces are required in cities so that our enjoyment of the urban is enhanced rather than finding ourselves being over come with some of the banalities that can occur with city life. By creating both inside and outside public space we provide a flexible city that can respond to the needs of its users in whatever way necessary.

Conclusion

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Argon, Louis, Paris Peasant ( Exact Change, 2004)

Calvino, Italo, Invisible Cities (London: Vintage Books, 1997)

Coverley, Merlin, Psychogeography (London: Pocket essentials, 2010)

Cullen, Gordon, Townscape (Oxford: Architectural Press , 1995)

Davis, J.G., The Secular Use of Church Buildings (London: SCM Press, 1968)

Der Kuntse, Akademie, Culture:City (Berlin: Lars Muller Publishers, 2013)

Gehl, Jan, Life in-between Building: Using Public Space (Skive: The Danish Architectural Press, 2006)

Helmus, Lisbeth M, Pieter Saenredam:The Utrecht Work: Paintings and Drawings by the 17th-century Master of Perspective (L.A:J. Paul Getty Museum, 2002)

Jacobs, Jane, The Death and Life of Great American Cities (London: Vintage Books, 1992)

Koolhaas, Rem, Delirious New York (New York: The Monacelli Press, 1994)

Koolhaas, Rem, “The Generic City” from S,M,L,XL (New York: The Monacelli Press, 1995)

McDonough, Tom, The Situationists and the City (Brooklyn:Verso Press, 2009)

Multiple Contributors, Building Happiness (London: Black Dog Publishing, 2008)

Narin, Ian, Words in Place (Nottingham: Five Leaves Publications, 2013)

Otto, Frei, Occupying and Connecting (Stuttgart: Axel Menges, 2009)

Self, Will, Psychogeography (London: Bloomsbury Publishing, 2007)

Smithson, Robert, A tour of the monuments of the passaic, New Jersey (1967)

Solnit, Rebecca, Wanderlust (London: Verso Press, 2001)

Bibliography

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End Notes

1. Solnit, Rebecca, Wanderlust (London: Verso Press, 2001), 26

2. Solnit, Rebecca, Wanderlust (London: Verso Press, 2001), 42

3. Debord, Guy, Introduction to a Critique of Urban Geography Essay (1955)

4. Chtcheglov, Ivan, Formulary for new Urbanism Essay (1953)

5. Debord, Guy, The Society of the Spectacle (1967), 62

6. Gehl, Jan, Life in-between Building: Using Public Space (Skive: The Danish Architectural Press, 2006), 15

7. Davis, J.G., The Secular Use of Church Buildings (London: SCM Press, 1968)

8. Helmus, Lisbeth M, Pieter Saenredam:The Utrecht Work: Paintings and Drawings by the 17th-century Master of Perspective (L.A:J. Paul Getty Museum, 2002)

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The project is an attempt to create a series of interior and exterior public rooms within the city that help to provide quality public space for all its inhabitants and allow for a better engagement with the city. Taking my home city of Limerick as an example of where many churches are closing down due to falling numbers of attendees, and there is a serious lack of well designed outdoor public space.

I am looking at the re purposing of a number of churches as examples, along with a new external public space and adjacent new building around the existing milk market and St Micheal’s church on Denmark St. This area is prime example of the left over space in the city which has been turned into a car park flanked by a half finished apartment block and a run down abandoned furniture store. The areas in which I am working in are outlined on the map adjacent.

Site/Intent

ResidentialOfficesBar/ResaurantsCar ParkAbandoned/Not RentedRetail

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Project Realised

Early Floor studies drawings of Amiens catherdral, along with floor studies of three churches in Limerick City.

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Studies looking at how the floor can connect different parts of the city and how its starting point could come from within the church and start to reach out.

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Highlighting the public space within the city Highlighting the importance of the shannon within the city

Showing the churches within the city Exploring how a route through the city connecting these place might work

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Showing all religious buildings within the city along with my main site

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Showing all religious buildings within the city as public within a nolli plan

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The side aisle of the church starting to be repurposed using timber partitions

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Moving the side aisle out taking over the whole church as new public space within the city

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1:50 Models of part of three churches in Limerick that would be repurposed

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1:1 Chair design looking at the relationship between scale, furniture and the human 1:2 Wall with incorporated bench seating, book holders, and ledge that could be put on the interior of the churches

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1:50 Model showing how structure can change from supporting a building to change to the scale of bench

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Exsisting Conditions on the main site

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Series of 1:500 Models exploring different arrangements of form on the site

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Final plan of overall site

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Section going through St Michaels church, the new public space and my built intervention

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1:20 Construction Detail

Glue laminated Timber beams with suspended cross laminated timber floor Perforated limestone cladding with glass on the interior

Construction Detail showing the make up of the building 1:50 Models exploring structure and fascade

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1:10 model of exterior benches and covering for market stalls using CNC technology 1:5 Drainage model details exploring how water can be dealt with on the site

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Final Site model 1:200

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Perspective of new public space that steps from the church to the new library hub

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Perspective of new public plaza around the church

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Perspective of site from under my built intervention

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Perspective of the space at night

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Final Presentation

andrew cusack thesis

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