The Irish Architectural Archive was established in 1976 by Dr Edward McParland and Nicholas Robinson as the National Trust Archive. Its objective is to collect and preserve material of every kind relating to the

architecture Architecture is the art and technique of designing and building, as distinguished from the skills associated with construction. It is both the process and the product of sketching, conceiving, planning, designing, and constructing buildings ...

Ireland Ireland ( ; ga, Éire ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe, north-western Europe. It is separated from Great Britain to its east by the North Channel (Grea ...

, and make it available to the public. It is based at 45

Merrion Square Merrion Square () is a Georgian garden square on the southside of Dublin city centre. History The square was laid out in 1752 by the estate of Viscount FitzWilliam and was largely complete by the beginning of the 19th century. The demand ...

Dublin Dublin (; , or ) is the capital and largest city of Ireland. On a bay at the mouth of the River Liffey, it is in the province of Leinster, bordered on the south by the Dublin Mountains, a part of the Wicklow Mountains range. At the 2016 ...

, and is an independent private company with charitable status. 45 Merrion Square, constructed in 1794, was restored between 2002 and 2004 for use as an archive by the

Office of Public Works The Office of Public Works (OPW) ( ga, Oifig na nOibreacha Poiblí) (legally the Commissioners of Public Works in Ireland) is a major Irish Government agency, which manages most of the Irish State's property portfolio, including hundreds of ow ...

, and is itself a notable example of the city's Georgian architecture. The

Archive An archive is an accumulation of historical records or materials – in any medium – or the physical facility in which they are located. Archives contain primary source documents that have accumulated over the course of an individual ...

comprises over 3,500 individual acquisitions, ranging from single items - a book, pamphlet, drawing or photograph - to the thousands of drawings and files created by large architectural practices. Colum O'Riordan is the current Director.

History

Edward McParland and Nicholas Robinson founded the National Trust Archive in 1976, with Nick Sheaf appointed the first Director, and premises at 63 Merrion Square. Among the founding items in the collection were drawings “from the practice established in Ireland by

Augustus Pugin Augustus Welby Northmore Pugin ( ; 1 March 181214 September 1852) was an English architect, designer, artist and critic with French and, ultimately, Swiss origins. He is principally remembered for his pioneering role in the Gothic Revival st ...

in the late 1830s”. The organisation was formally designated national archive status in 1996, by

Ruairi Quinn Ruairi Quinn (born 2 April 1946) is an Irish former Labour Party politician who served as Minister for Education and Skills from 2011 to 2014, Leader of the Labour Party from 1997 to 2002, Deputy Leader of the Labour Party from 1989 to 1997, ...

who was then minister of finance. Alistair Rowan was appointed Director in 1981, and the organisation was renamed the Irish Architectural Archive and moved to number 73 Merrion Square. It moved on to 45 Merrion Square in 2004.

Collections

Drawings

The collections represent the largest body of historic architectural records in Ireland. They include the most significant body of historic Irish architectural drawings in the world, with in excess of 250,000 drawings ranging in date from the late seventeenth to the twentieth centuries.

Photographs

Also housed in the Archive are over 400,000

photographs A photograph (also known as a photo, image, or picture) is an image created by light falling on a photosensitive surface, usually photographic film or an electronic image sensor, such as a CCD or a CMOS chip. Most photographs are now creat ...

, making this one of the largest collections of photographs in Ireland.

Print

The Archive also holds an extensive

reference library A library is a collection of materials, books or media that are accessible for use and not just for display purposes. A library provides physical (hard copies) or digital access (soft copies) materials, and may be a physical location or a vir ...

, with more than 15,000 items of printed matter.

The Peter and Mary Doyle Collection

The IAA holds a collection of photographs and drawings bequeathed by Irish modernist architects Peter and Mary Doyle.

Exhibitions

3-13 March 2020, ''Exhibition for a Good Man,'' a solo exhibition by Irish artist Paula Pohli. 2019, ''A Visual Window to an Ecclesiastical World'', of historical drawings of Church of Ireland buildings, curated by Dr Michael O’Neill FSA. 2018, ''Memorialising the Sacred'', an installation exploring sacred buildings in Crete, curated by Anthony Kelly, Seán McCrum, Paddy Sammon and David Stalling. 2017, ''House and Home,'' an exhibition of drawings, publications, models and photographs of mid-18th century to late 20th-century Irish homes. The exhibition marked the 40th anniversary of the archive. 2016, ICC Speak, a collaboration with the Irish Composers’ Collective, featuring immersive installations and performances by: Anna Clifford and Veronica Szabo (Very Clock theatre company); Michelle O’Rourke; the Kirkos Ensemble (who performed work by Adam Bradley, Kevin Free and Robbie Blake); Tonnta Music (who performed compositions by Róisín Hayes and Shell Dooley).

External links

Irish Architectural Archive

References

{{Authority control Archives in the Republic of Ireland Architecture in Ireland