DeValera Library & Súil Art Gallery

An OJEU (Official Journal of the European Union) announcement and architectural competition based on conceptual approach with interview in response to the client’s detailed brief. This process established the essential design principles that we used to define the project at the outset and in essence framed the project through its long design and construction process to final completion.

Clare County Council’s new 2,321m² DeValera Library & Súil Art Gallery sits on a prominent site in the county town of Ennis. The site includes the 485-seat Glór Theatre (opened 2001), and sits opposite the historic Poor Clare Monastery and Monastery Park, an important green space at the edge of Ennis town centre.

By placing the new elements, the DeValera Library and the Súil Art Gallery immediately abutting the existing Glór, we created a new cultural nexus uniting the three primary colours of the arts – the visual, the literary and performing arts – into a single complex, serving the town, county, and region.

The library, art gallery, and Glór are interlinked through a new double height colonnaded portico and main entrance, maximising connectivity between the arts triptych contained within. Being prominently placed at the head of Monastery Park orientates this important new cultural complex directly to the routes from the historic town centre.

The new building is wrapped in a 10m high, undulating curved reconstituted stone façade that unites the entire building complex. A huge window in the main facade opens up daytime views from the library interior and main staircase to Monastery Park opposite, whilst as dusk falls the glazing appears to dissolve and the inner glow of the library is revealed to the world.

The library over two floors, with more than 73,000 books, numerous publications, archives and other media, is the largest element within the new complex. Open and transparent within, a large void and public stair in the middle of the plan overlooking Monastery Park gives a strong visual and movement permeability between the levels and the various library sections. The County Library Service has been placed in a simple bar of adaptable office space above the library, whilst the Súil with its adjoining sculpture court, sits across from the library’s main entrance.

The pale polished reconstructed stone façade is integral with pre-cast concrete panels. This material allowed the flowing external form to be achieved whilst also delivering the very quality of finely detailed surfaces and ribbed texture to the exterior of the building, establishing an important and appropriately civic landmark architecture within the town. Metalwork and glazing systems are bronze-coloured powder-coated aluminium, and Irish limestone paves the immediate surrounding ground surfaces.

During the course of the design development a structured and extensive consultation process was key to building consensus and public support for the project. Public presentations and workshops were undertaken by the architects and the library services team with public interest groups, users and staff alike to refine proposals from a very early stage. This process resulted in a building which has been designed and constructed to set new standards of accessibility and inclusivity enabling the building to welcome all users regardless of impairment or disability.

Working nationally and internationally, much of our portfolio consists of major arts, cultural and civic projects, usually in town or city contexts. Our ethos is fundamentally concerned with a balance between simplicity, proportion, aesthetics, function and sustainability in architecture. Our designs are governed by concerns for the interplay of space, light, form, functionality and material coupled with careful consideration for scale history and context.

The DeValera Library & Súil Art Gallery is a key building within our oeuvre. It is concerned with upholding those principles, making an important sustainable civic building which are demonstrably 21st-century whilst also redefining the existing edge of town context in which it sits.

Email interview conducted by John Hill.