RICHARD HURLEY & ASSOCIATES ARCHITECTS
St. Augustinian's Church, Augustine Street, Galway
Client's Comments
The Augustinian Church in Galway has been a place of
worship
since the late 1850s. It was an inner city, Religious devotional Church and it
was not then envisaged that baptism, confirmations, marriages and funerals
would
be celebrated there. It became a parish church in 1971, however, giving rise to
an entirely different set of liturgical obligations and requirements.
In October, 2001 a project team, formed from community
members, defined the guiding principles of the project (project mission)
as:
To Create through Preservation and Enhancement a bright, intimate, sacred, warm, functional yet flexible, prayerful, quiet, accessible, inviting and attractive Church, within
the constraints of ensuring value for money through an implementation process
to commence after Easter, 2002.
The renovation and renewal of the Augustinian Church and Priory, Middle Street,
Galway was a small but complex project with very specific constraints arising
from its protected structure status. The successful outcome of the
project,
which evolved well beyond an original scope of re-decoration, depended on an
effective collaboration between the project team, design team and contractors
and specialists. The realised design addressed all the project goals and a
wonderful outcome has been achieved.