By the mid 2000s, Pomodoro’s sphere was starting to show its scars. This photo from 2005 is a good example of the damage it had suffered.
#9 The World Keeps Turning
#8 Launching Berkeley50
This week, the Berkeley50 programme of events was officially launched by the Provost, Patrick Prendergast. You can read the Provost’s speech here. Continue reading “#8 Launching Berkeley50”
#7 Musical Chairs – The Music Library’s Sojourns in the Berkeley
Our Music Librarian, Roy Stanley, gives a brief account of the award-winning Music Library…
Almost from the moment it opened in 1967 the New Library was being adapted for new uses as the needs of the College changed.
The Music Library was first set up as a distinct unit within the Library in 1971, using two rooms in the ‘Library Annexe’ – an area of the basement in the Berkeley Library with a separate side entrance opposite the Museum Building. Continue reading “#7 Musical Chairs – The Music Library’s Sojourns in the Berkeley”
#6 Trees Come Down
In our last post we saw that the Berkeley’s site was a stand of trees, between Fellows’ Gardens to the west and College Park to the east, with New Square to the north and Nassau Street to the south. The main image shows this vista from New Square, reproduced from the pamphlet International architectural competition for a new library building. Continue reading “#6 Trees Come Down”
#5 When All This Was Fields
The area where the Berkeley Library was eventually built was once a copse of trees, facing into College into the area known as Fellows’ Gardens – now, Fellows’ Square.
Continue reading “#5 When All This Was Fields”#4 Sphere Within Sphere
…or to use the Italian, Sfera con Sfera.
Art has always played a large role in the Berkeley Library – we’ll explore this in depth in further posts, and for some, the Berkeley itself is a sculpture of sorts. But one of the most recognisable features of the Berkeley – indeed, of Trinity – isn’t an original feature of the Library.
#3 What Might Have Been 1
The appeal for funds for the new library was wide-ranging, and in the great tradition of universities looking for funds, Trinity turned towards its alumni with 11,000 copies of the pamphlet Extension of the College Library: An appeal to our graduates printed and sent to graduates in 1957.
The main image above shows a detail from that booklet, subtitled “How the new building might look”. It’s a very different realisation of what would be appropriate for the space that eventually housed the Berkeley – but it’s easy to see why, nestled between the Old Library and the Museum Building, this might be thought the appropriate tack to take.
#2 “One Of Five Great Libraries”
In 1958, the fundraising campaign to start raising the capital necessary to construct a new library began in earnest, with a public launch on 15 July in the Long Room. This led to the release of the promotional film, Building for Books, in theatres. It’s not often a film about libraries makes it to the cinema, but this managed it.
Continue reading “#2 “One Of Five Great Libraries””
#1: A “Brutalist Gem”
“In commissioning this brutalist gem in the 1960s, the elders of Trinity College displayed remarkable bravery and vision.”
Wallpaper* City Guide: Dublin.
So, why is the Berkeley brutalist? Is it really so harsh – looking at the buildings that surrounded it on its construction it was very clearly different, but brutal?