Overview

Michael Scott’s Áras Mhic Dhiarmada and Busáras is one of the most important modernist buildings in Ireland. Built between 1947 and 1953, it was intended to be a bus station like no other, providing ordinary working people with a range of amenities including a roof-top restaurant, incredible panoramic views of Dublin, a crèche, a 24-hour newsreel cinema, and a host of shops and services. It was to be a microcosm of the city, providing dignity, comfort, and convenience to bus users. From its inception the project was gripped in controversy, over the location, design, function, and cost. Battles were waged on the floor of the Dáil, in Dublin Corporation Committee meetings and the letters of various newspapers. Construction ground to a halt for three years as Government and opposition argued over the merits and uses of the building. In the end it became home to the Department of Social Protection and Bus Éireann’s provincial bus services. Despite receiving widespread acclaim for its architectural and design innovations, today it is a much maligned and misunderstood building. In this exciting collaboration, writer Eoin Ó Broin and photographer Mal McCann explore the vision behind Áras Mhic Dhiarmada and Busáras, and celebrate the energy, creativity, and neglect of this incredible example of Irish modernist architecture and design.

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9781785374180

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Reviews

'It is very well written and has been rightly and critically acclaimed for the descriptiveness of Eoin's prose and for its historic detail. He tells the story of an egalitarian effort, led by pioneering architect Michael Scott, to create a building, uniquely Irish, utilitarian yet uplifting...He draws on the creativity and photographic skills of Mal McCann to take us through Busaras as it is today. I have long admired Mal's photos. He has an eye for the common place, the quirky angle, and the beauty of everyday things. His use of light is ingenious.' -- Gerry Adams * The Irish Echo *

'It is very well written and has been rightly and critically acclaimed for the descriptiveness of Eoin’s prose and for its historic detail. He tells the story of an egalitarian effort, led by pioneering architect Michael Scott, to create a building, uniquely Irish, utilitarian yet uplifting...He draws on the creativity and photographic skills of Mal McCann to take us through Busáras as it is today. I have long admired Mal’s photos. He has an eye for the common place, the quirky angle, and the beauty of everyday things. His use of light is ingenious.' -- Gerry Adams * The Irish Echo *

Author Information

Eoin Ó Broin is a TD for Dublin Mid-West and Sinn Féin’s spokesperson on Housing, Planning and Local Government. He is author of Matxinada, Basque Nationalism and Radical Basque Youth Movements (LRB 2003), Sinn Féin and the Politics of Left Republicanism (Pluto 2009), Home: Why Public Housing is the Answer (Merrion Press, 2019), and Defects: Living with the Legacy of the Celtic Tiger (Merrion Press, 2019). He is a regular contributor to the Sunday Business Post and An Phoblacht.

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