Dublin City Hall.. and Lego

😀 😀 😀

Brilliant!
That is really fantastic – the dentil course bricks are ingenious! That is by far the most important aspect of any Lego model (apparently :)) – choosing what bricks to use that will best reflect the character and scale of what you’re trying to replicate. And to think this was all done when the building was as black as coal!

The scale and proportions of the building as a whole are simply superb – from a distance its near-on perfect.
And as for the pediment from afar – magnificent! Just a shame the windows look like PVC…

ok, I must say that’s an incredible piece of work.. I wonder if the exhibit has any lego tips and tricks…
Because the scaling looks awesome…
Is there any idea of the time frame in which that took?

I am having flashbacks to my youth here. I remember seeing that when it was first built. It was at the ‘lego exhibition’ and I think it was part of the Dublin 1988 Millenium celebrations. I have a photo of it from the time somewhere!

Thanks for posting it Morlan

Fantastic,

plastic swipe cards of the City for its creator

what a great job – both the model and as a career

Pity bright green bricks only came later – they would have been perfect for the dome:

I must admit to having attempted a few Dublin buildings in my time, the Custom House being the only vaguely successful one – ‘successful’ in terms of the resources of a 13 year old and their broken up sets you’ll understand 🙂
I’d post the sole surviving picture, but…well, y’know…

@Paul Clerkin wrote:

what a great job – both the model and as a career

Apparently when Lego Windsor was being constructed a number of Oxford students were used to execute the models and received in the region of £15k each for 3 months work and at most 2-3 buildings

Not quite on Lego, but as part of Dundalk’s ‘retail park’ :rolleyes: currently being developed, a large model park is planned, apparently to be one of the best of its kind in Europe. I’ve heard that major Irish buildings will feature, but it all may come to nothing…

I used to work for a firm and we built a number of scale models for a model park in Wicklow including Russborough, Longford Terrace in Monkstown, and Bolands Mill…

a city of biscuits
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/in_pictures/4733304.stm

That is fantastic, the detail and scale are faultless. Well done to everyone who put it together, (even the quantity surveyor).
Is it still on public display somewhere? I’d love to see it.
Or (rant coming up) did my neighbour’s 5 year old brat get his grubby little hands on it and turn it into a spaceship, robot or some other hideous creature along the lines of Hawkins House.
All of us who loved Lego as kids will know what I mean. Our architectural masterpieces were torn to pieces and lost forever by that same neighbours brat (they’re everywhere) when our back was turned.
And all becuase of those distracting threats eminating from the kitchen downstairs. “Your dinner is getting cold”.

Ah Global Citizen, you’re looking at it the wrong way. It was a vital life lesson on the ephemeral nature of the successes we achieve through our powers of actualization and how our innate idealistic reaction against authoritarianism is triumphed by the the fundamental demands and appetites associated our physical manifestation.

I must admit I was somewhat in the brutalist school when it came to Lego. Form was secondary to function. Then when technics appeared that was the end of my architectural phase. I gave up building houses and other buildings and dedicated myself to mechanical projects. Before that the only way to build stuff with moving parts was with Mechano but jeezus what a frustrating experience that could be.

I’ve a vague memory of GrahamH and a lego model of the Late Late set?

ahhhh, that model is really cool ….good one!!

I remembering seeing this on the Late Late toy show when I was a kid. Think there was a competition to guess the number of bricks used? Anyone else remember?

If you look very carefully there is a lego GrahamH taking a photo and shaking his head at the state of the lego pavement 😀

Anyone here ever see The Late Late Show hosted by that well known Southside squatter Pat the Plank all made, remarkably, in Lego?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6kTZSw-5g1Y

i think the unassuming poster immediately before you may have seen it once or twice 😉

annnnnnyway…

I’m regretting this already, but in the spirit of New Year frivolity, I unearthed some prints of some distinctly dubious childhood recreations of Dublin buildings. The Custom House as I recall took over a whole corner of the bedroom.

Gandon must be rolling in his grave.

In retrospect, I seem to have carried out a Francis Johnstonesque filling in of the arcades. How very tongue-in-cheek. Clearly additional floorspace is an equally pressing concern in the Lego world. Not a disastrous attempt for a 12/13 year old though. As with most of these models, the whole facade was floodlit with 12v bulbs, with an extra powerful flood for the cupola :). Others were dicreetly hidden behind the balustrade. I remember being especially proud of the clock, which was back-illuminated in green. Alas the compose -> flash -> live-with-it process of an automatic camera didn’t quite do it justice :(. The woeful dome was a dodgily painted Mullerice pot.

Hopefully this one can be made out without a caption.

Again, severely constrained by the Great Brick Shortage of the mid-90s. A Neil Jordan-like artistic licence was taken in respect of O’Connell Street. And I don’t care what anyone says – plastic Victorian municipal planting is far more gracious a foil to the GPO than a rank of 7Up taxi bikes :). The innovation in this case was that Hibernia, Fidelity and Mercury were individually illuminated (if just a tad out of proportion lol).

And a stripped Big Ben (must be the Lego recession), dating from goodness knows when. It’s only worthy of remark for that marvellous wallpaper.

Hmmm lots and lots of lego bricks of the same colour….no just making do with the odd blue foursy or a few red twoseys…..you must have been rich!

GrahamH, I get the distinct impression that you had indulgent parents when growing up as a child.

Or an indulgent father perhaps. One who was on the receiving end of many a wifely glare as the violin or piano in the corner – invested with so many maternal dreams of filial greatness – gathered dust…

You also seem to be way ahead of your time having anticipated the GPO plaza 20 years before it happened…. a visionary no less!! 😀

Okay if I’d known this was to turn into a psychoanalysing session, I’d never have posted! Indulgent parents indeed – says the PD from Howth 😉

The reason the brick colour was so uniform is that every birthday and Christmas for a decade equalled Lego – inevitably town sets. So quite the collection of white hospitals, restaurants and police stations built up! A shame tan brick wasn’t widely available then – the perfect Ardbraccan limestone substitute. Tsk.

Although the purist wouldn’t allow it either way of course…

Anyway the point of this is to encourage others to post about their earlier architectural ambitions, so come on! (and with a particularly uncomfortable focus on jimg).

Oh and a remarkably astute observation on Irish built heritage conservation.