Sunlight Chambers

Sunlight Chambers (view from the northeast)

Sunlight / Sunlight soaps from different countries

Facade detail

Sunlight Chambers is the name of a listed office and commercial building in the district of Temple Bar in Dublin ( 20-21 Parliament Street , corner of Essex Quay ). It is named after the soap brand Sunlight (German sunlight ) from the British company Lever Brothers .

story

The company Lever Brothers was in 1895 by William Hesketh Lever and his brother James near Liverpool founded. The most famous product soon became Sunlight , the world's first packaged branded laundry soap. A special feature of Sunlight was that in industrial production, vegetable oils such as palm oil were used instead of the animal fats that were customary up to that time.

When Lever Brothers wanted to set up a branch in Dublin, they leased a plot of land on the banks of the Liffey directly opposite Grattan Bridge for 150 years for a lease of £ 43 a year in 1899 and commissioned the architect Edward Ould from Liverpool to build a prestigious company building. Ould had previously designed various buildings for the Port Sunlight factory complex near Liverpool for the company . During the construction, Ould was attacked as a foreign architect by his colleagues in Dublin. After completion in 1902, the Irish Builder described the Sunlight Chambers as "the ugliest building in Dublin", and a few years later as "ostentatious and pathetic".

After the Lever Brothers , the Sunlight Chambers were among others. the Irish Revenue Commissioners and the Irish Horse Racing Association ( Racing Board ). Today the building is owned by a law firm , which also has its offices here.

In the late 1990s, the Sunlight Chambers were extensively restored.

layout

Ould designed the Sunlight Chambers in an Italian style that is unusual for Dublin. In its original state it was a four-story building with two window axes on the east side ( Parliament Street ), a beveled corner and three window axes on the north ( Essex Quay ). The hipped roof has in this area over a protruding eaves with figuratively decorated wooden consoles . The building was later extended to the west by a three-story extension with two window axes, which was stylistically aligned with the main building.

For the load-bearing structure of the building, Ould resorted to the then modern steel frame construction .

The facade consists of rusticated granite on the ground floor, while the walls on the upper floors are plastered from Portland limestone except for the stone window frames . The plastered areas were originally painted peach-colored. At the beginning of the restoration, they had a heavily soiled, formerly white paint. Ultimately, the architects then decided on a yellowish shade. The paint contains a special black pigment that is supposed to counteract renewed soiling. In addition, the new color should better accentuate the violet-bluish ceramic friezes (see below).

On the ground floor the windows (except on the narrow east side) are designed as wide arched windows , on the first floor as large rectangular windows with relatively simple aedicules . The second and third floors are equipped with biforias , to which a continuous row of arcades was added on the top floor , which is only interrupted at the corners of the building.

The roof is covered with terracotta-colored roof tiles. During the restoration, 80% of the original bricks could be reused, the replacement for the remaining 20% was imported from Italy.

The entrance is on the east side and has a richly decorated portal aedicula with Ionic pilasters .

The most striking details of the facade are two friezes made of relief-like modeled and colored glazed ceramic on the first and second floors. These reliefs were created by the Buckinghamshire sculptor and potter Conrad Dressler . The history of hygiene is presented on a total of 12 panels . The motifs shown include, above all, the various work steps involved in washing clothes . But also less thematically obvious scenes are depicted, such as peasants plowing or workers building an arch . Presumably, these motifs were supposed to symbolize how dirty the laundry was then to be washed. These friezes are complemented by four separate round reliefs with female busts on the ground floor. The painter and author Peter Pearson sees this building decoration as a reference to the art of the Renaissance , especially that of Luca della Robbia .

In the area of the later extension in the west, the friezes are not designed as colorful reliefs, but consist of simple blue ceramic tiles .

During the restoration in the 1990s, the ceramic friezes were also repainted and glazed.

In contrast to the representative facade, the interior of the Sunlight Chambers is kept rather simple.

Another building with the same name

Practically at the same time as in Dublin, Lever Brothers had a branch set up in Newcastle upon Tyne at Bigg Market (corner of High Bridge) ( ⊙ ), which was also named Sunlight Chambers . The architects here were William and Segar Owen. These two (father and son) had also designed buildings for Port Sunlight , for example the congregational Christ Church .

Although built in different styles, both Sunlight Chambers have some things in common. Both cases are representative corner buildings with the entrance on the narrower side. The Sunlight Chambers in Newcastle were also provided with a surrounding frieze between the ground floor and first floor, which, however, consists of mosaic and shows scenes from harvest and industry. This building is also a listed building ( Grade II ).