Bridgefoot Street – External Concrete

Client: Bracegrade and Dublin City Council

Grinding and polishing of customised external concrete 

A new community park opened to the public in May 2022 after many delays due to the lockdowns. The park, which covers 2 acres, is designed by Dublin 8-based designers Dermot Foley Landscape Architects for Dublin City Council Parks, Biodiversity & Landscape Services, and was developed from a wide-ranging community design process undertaken in 2017. External Concrete at Dublin park was a great project to be part of and worth a visit.

The Liberties Greening Strategy

The park is the second of two flagship amenities provided in the area under The Liberties Greening Strategy, an area-wide environmental programme designed to improve public spaces and streets and increase greening, tree cover and access to amenities in this dense city centre neighbourhood. Nearby Weaver Park opened in 2018. Other existing parks in the area, such as St Audoen’s Park and Peace Garden at Christchurch Place, have also seen significant investment in recent years.

Recycle and reuse

Among Bridgefoot Street Park’s features are a landscape of mounds and sunny terraces; a community garden (with an active community management group rearing to go); a cafe; play areas and informal play features; over 180 trees and a diverse range of wild and naturalistic planting. An ethos of ‘recycle and reuse’ permeates the park. For example, footpaths through the park make use of old paving slabs, bricks and even sections of concrete footpaths, stitched together to form interesting ‘crazy paving’.

Wildflower planting fills the park, creating a haven for pollinators. The park is expected to support the growing Inner City Bee Project which has seen beehives installed across Dublin 8. The park is open on its four sides, creating new walkways and connections between Bridgefoot Street and Bonham Street.  Bridgefoot Street Park will also be a playful adventure ground for young people, with lots of new play features and sensory elements.

Close up of external concrete

The concrete that was poured was quite unique as the architects made an effort to try and incorporate elements from the various buildings and businesses that would have been in the locality. Some of these items include fragments of brick and glass excavated from the site, which was a former housing complex.