Gandon’s lasting architectural impression

MANY English men and women have come to this country down through the centuries but when it comes to assessing the lasting impressions they have left on the land, James Gandon must surely rank very highly.
The London-born architect designed some of our most famous buildings, both public and private. Many of his public buildings are well known. His private houses include Abbeyville House, which he designed for John Beresford, the then Revenue Commissioner for Ireland. Many years later, that house became better known as the family residence of Charles Haughey.
Those of us old enough carried prints of some of his work around in our pockets for years. He designed the Custom House in Dublin and on the building are carved heads representing the various rivers of Ireland. These were the heads that were depicted on the back of the old ‘Lady Lavery’ currency notes.
Following his studies, Gandon opened an architectural practice in London and entered a competition to design the Dublin City Hall. He failed in that competition but his work attracted the attention of those who were spearheading the development of what was then the second city of the Empire. Soon afterwards, he was invited to Dublin to construct the Custom House.
This was before the Act of Union, when there was an Irish Parliament in Dublin and a period of great development. Just to prove that some things change very little, there were many objections to the building of the Custom House. The suitability of the site was questioned, as the chosen land was basically an uninhabited swamp.
Merchants near the old Custom House objected because they saw it as moving the centre of trade too far down river, with a consequential drop in their trade. Supposedly, opposition to the taxes raised to pay for it was so high that Beresford had to keep Gandon hidden in his own home during the start of the project. Eventually, work got underway and was completed at a cost of over £200,000.
While work was continuing on the Custom House, he undertook work on the House of Parliament. Among his additions were the portico and columns over the footpath between Westmoreland Street and Dame Street. He wanted to use a similar design on the Four Courts but objections forced him to move the building several feet back from the quays. He also designed the Kings Inn, the Rotunda and Carlisle Bridge (now O’Connell Bridge).
Some of his further plans were never carried out. He wanted triumphal arches over the Carlisle Bridge and at the entrance to the Phoenix Park but the Corporation decided to build Nelson’s Column and the Wellington Monument instead. Apart from the Haughey family home, his major private designs were Emo Court in County Laois and town houses around Mountjoy Square and Gardiner Street.
The passing of the Act of Union led to the decline of Dublin and an end to great building projects. He went to London briefly but returned to Dublin in 1805. He lived out his retirement at his home in Lucan, where he died in 1823.
James Gandon, the architect whose buildings figured prominently in the history of the last 200 years, was born in London on February 29 – 270 years ago this week.