CHANCERY PLACE FEATURING CHANCERY HOUSE AND PARK [FEBRUARY 2022]
The Dublin Christian Mission is located at Chancery Place. it serves as a Christian community centre for a variety of different ministry opportunities. Some of the opportunities include youth clubs, community events, Cafe, small groups, transitional housing, short-term teams, food pantry and office space.
For me the most interesting thing about Chancery Place is the Chancery Place Flats [Chancery House] complex which was designed by Herbert G. Simms.
The Chancery Park flats have been described as, “a small carefully conceived building containing 27 flats with an adjoining enclosed garden which was completed in 1935.” A plaque on the gateway to the complex is dedicated to Herbert Simms who was appointed Housing Architect for the city of Dublin in 1932. Herbert George Simms, died September 28 1948.
Until 1932 new housing in Dublin had been the responsibility of the city architect, Horace O’Rourke. Between 1923 and 1931 new dwellings were being erected at an average rate of 555 per annum, but the shortage of adequate housing in the city remained acute. In 1932 or 1933 a separate housing architect’s Department was formed with specific responsibility for the design and erection of new dwellings, as distinct from their administration and maintenance. Simms was appointed to the new post of Corporation housing architect. He immediately recruited a temporary staff to assist him in the task which confronted him. In 1935 alone 1,552 dwellings were completed. During the sixteen years he was in office, Simms was responsible for the design and erection of some 17,000 new homes, ranging from striking blocks of flats in the central city [influenced by new apartment blocks by de Klerk in Amsterdam and J.P. Oud in Rotterdam] to extensive suburban housing schemes such as those at Crumlin and Cabra.
In 1891, Dublin Medical Mission was established with a view to working amongst the poor of Dublin. Its first premises were ‘two small rooms at Inns Quay’, and it moved to No.6 Chancery Place in 1893. As the number of patients increased, it became necessary to extend the building and the neighbouring building was taken over. The mission was employed as a training facility for missionaries who went to work in Africa, Asia and South America. Designed by George Palmer Beater, this elaborate building incorporates No.5 and No.6 Chancery Street, and No.31 and No.32 Charles Street West, and makes a strong impression on the streetscape of the former. Its red brick, sandstone and terracotta detailing are well executed, testament to the skill of stone masons and brick workers at the time. The ornate appearance of the façade is belied by its regularity and well proportioned fenestration pattern.
The Dublin Christian Mission is the amalgamation of three older Missions located in Dublin, Ireland in 1965: the Dublin City Mission (founded 1828), the Dublin Medical Mission (1891) and the Dublin Mission (1953). It is the second oldest in the world.
In 1826, David Nasmith founded his first city mission in Glasgow. Two years later, Naismith founded the Dublin City Mission at Merchants Hall, Wellington Quay in Dublin, a similar organization. Other missions followed throughout Naismith’s life, including one in London in 1835.
In 1879, the Mission relocated to Anglesea Street, constructing a main hall and a number of offices. By 1903, seventy five years after its founding, the Dublin Mission had eleven full-time missionaries under the leadership of Rev. J.C. Irwin.
In December 1939, the Mission once again relocated to newly built headquarters in Cashel Road, Crumlin, an area which had grown to some 13,000 residents in the past thirty years. This area was chosen because the Dublin Corporation had built some three to four thousand houses for working-class families nearby. Another factor came from a fall in attendance at the location at Anglesea Street as people migrated from the centre of the city. Crumlin Hall was later sold to the Brethren Assembly in the area. Some years after it was sold again to the Dublin Corporation, the current property owner.
Dublin Christian MIssion continues services today, operating the largest independent Christian Youth work in the city of Dublin with over 300 young people making over 1,000 calls to the Youth Centre at 5&6 Chancery Place, Dublin 7. The homeless and hungry are fed at the drop in centre at 28 Pearse Street. Many of those attending for the food and clothing have a chaotic lifestyle of dependence on drugs or alcohol.
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