University College Cork have lodged a planning application to demolish one of Cork’s last great examples of mid-century industrial heritage. This petition was started by a number of citizens, architects, graduates and students who are alarmed at the proposed demolition of such unique Cork architecture.

Completed in 1964 by renowned Cork architect Frank Murphy, the Cork Distillers Bottling plant (Later Irish Distillers) has a wealth of design and eccentric materiality with visual details which are unique and unusual for a utilitarian building found in Cork City. Distinguished by glossy bright yellow glazed brick and a neat window arrangement with sculptural cast concrete, it faces the river on a former island distillery which originally bottled Paddy Whiskey and Cork Dry Gin on the North Mall, Cork City until 2007.

The Building is currently not protected (despite publications, requests and several architectural Thesis’s on its conversion). In fact, Cork’s twentieth century architecture is scantly acknowledged or included in the Cork City Register of Protected Structures. Yet the Council’s development plan describes our architectural heritage as ‘a unique resource and reflects the history of our commercial and social development and demonstrates the different building techniques and varying materials and designs’. We believe our mid-twentieth century heritage adds to Cork’s character and history.

Even more important perhaps is the questionable validity of knocking down a building prematurely and replacing it with another. If we were to adopt that attitude to much of Cork’s varied heritage, our cultural environment would suffer disastrously, eroding our built legacy.

We need to question, and to hold our educational institutions accountable, for the future sustainability of indeed knocking down such heritage and replacing it with another glass faculty building on the same site.  As a society we are mature now as to have a conversation, that is not a yes or a no to demolition, but a broader approach around these important buildings.  

Of course, buildings must evolve over time. The proposed development is to be a new wing of the Tyndall National Institute. A welcome and important project. In the case of the Bottling plant, it is a factory, an embodiment of adaptation, reuse and constant updating of systems. It would be relatively simple to remove the non-structural internal partitions, create new large extension wings, or replace the roof. We need not look to international examples of industrial factory conversions; a prime Irish example is the conversion of the Scott Tallon Walker Carroll’s Cigarette factory (1969) to the now Dundalk Institute of Technology campus, which was converted by the same architects for this application. 

If the owners, developers, and their architects of these sites are to ignore and remove, our cultural environment would suffer disastrous levels of erosion; not to mention the destruction of the built legacy we leave for future generations. There is so much more potential and value to use our existing architecture and built environment to create something that is both striking and innovative to tell the city’s story for generations to come.

 

Please sign our petition in support of this building.

 

Articles and further reading:

https://www.riai.ie/discover-architecture/architecture-ireland/the-cork-distillers-bottling-plant-1961-1964​

https://www.irishexaminer.com/property/homeandoutdoors/arid-30856730.html​

https://www.irishexaminer.com/property/homeandoutdoors/arid-30971717.html​

https://www.archiseek.com/2018/1964-irish-distillers-bottling-plant-north-mall-cork/