The brief was to provide a new reception and waiting area, additional meeting rooms and upgraded security provisions for the Dept of Agriculture. The context for the project was the existing double height entrance hall in its Kildare Street headquarters - a speculatively built mid-1970's office building.

 

The proposal treats the hall as a quasi-public/outdoor space, into which are placed a series of plane and objects which use the rear wall of the hall as a backdrop. A gallery at first floor level accommodates the two meeding rooms and conference room. They are accessed by a new stone and steel staircase at one end of the hall, or by a new connection into the existing lift lobby. The stairs, with its spine wall and canopy, acts as a formal counterpoint to the distorted elliptical form of the conference room at the far end, adjacent to Kildare Place.

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The project introduces a new glass lobby and canopy into the existing acrade, this is washed with light. The reception desk is located in the low horizontal space beneath the gallery. the large tapestry by Patrick Scott which was originally commissioned for the building is relocated, and is now seen in a fragmented way as one ascends the staircase.