ELMPARK
This new upmarket urban quarter of 100,000m2 is a low energy, high density mixed use project. It consists of a private hospital, hotel, offices, apartments and housing for senior citizens, along with cafes and sandwich bars, all provided in a richly landscaped park - like setting that features a changing life through the course of the days, seasons and years.
The best aspect of this €500 million proposal is the opportunity to retain the unique parkland site setting as a ‘green lung’ for the city. All of our buildings have a compact footprint to minimise their impact on the ground and to reduce any obstructions to views that frame the Dublin Mountains.
A rich mix of uses ensures an ongoing 24-hour ebb and flow of life on the site. The urban ‘carpet’/ ’landscape’ is enriched by creating a web of new routes, intersections and node points on its surface all of which make a new blueprint of new possibilities for footfall across the site.
Design Strategy
We have designed a continuous garden covering the ground floor levels. The buildings overhead define different areas within this garden, with courtyards built on the north–south axis between them. The individual buildings will take on a character of their own, framing different views of the mountains beyond and providing reference points within the overall scheme.
The garden areas are stratified from north to south. At the northern end is a hard-landscaped area where taxis and other vehicles can drop off passengers at the individual buildings, a public concourse where people can circulate between buildings and a slightly lower area for informal meetings etc.
Public Gardens
The public concourse overlooking the gardens is at the heart of the scheme. Linking all the buildings, it will be a meeting place and a place of business, where general communal facilities can be located, including cafes, small bookshops and other amenities. Informal gathering spaces are encouraged and sheltered by canopies of lightweight tensile fabric. Entrances into the office buildings, hotel and hospital are directly off this concourse.
Special Design Features
The Elm Park Development is a massive 100,000m2 development and the entire project includes a combined heat and power generation system fuelled by woodchip biomass.
Electricity is generated onsite and hot water supplied to apartments as a by-product.
All the buildings utilise their orientation to maximise wind-driven ventilation and to benefit from solar energy. . .
