The building is renowned for its audacious appearance, towering over the East Wall rooftops. Its unique features include its circular windows of various sizes (from 650mm to 2,500mm in diameter), and walls of corrugated concrete, which was meticulously hand sanded to achieve the desired finish.
The concrete finish is continued inside; all internal soffits are exposed fair faced concrete, with most internal walls lined with timber. Extensive planning and coordination of the concrete pours was needed to line up plywood joints in the wall and soffit shutters with all the internal finishes.
The Architectural Review has praised the Sean O’Casey Community Centre’s “brilliant, disingenuous architectural idealism”, and the building won in the Building Category in the 2009 Irish Concrete Society Awards. It was also shortlisted for the Royal Institute of British Architects’ (RIBA) prestigious Lubetkin Prize for architecture.
