Select Image Below To Visit The Photo Gallery: What Remained After Two Fires

Photographed By William Murphy - Select Image To View Photographs

___

I USED A CANON IDs MkIII

___

The stretch of land between Upper Abbey Street and Great Strand Street is currently a hive of construction activity. Known as Project Ash, this ambitious development is set to introduce two major Marriott-branded hotels to the city centre. However, beneath the modern steel and glass lies a history defined by Dublin’s industrial past and a series of dramatic, high-temperature blazes that once lit up the city sky.

___

___

I am working my way through my catalogs of older images and I had great difficulty identifying this series of photographs but with the help of some friends I now know that was the site of a major film (movie) vault on Upper Abbey Street

The Film District’s Dangerous Heart

Long before it was a construction site, this block was the unofficial "Film District" of Dublin. From the early to mid-20th century, the area housed the distribution hubs for global giants such as Warner Bros and 20th Century Fox.

The buildings were used as vaults to store thousands of movie reels. In those days, film was printed on cellulose nitrate, a highly volatile material. Nitrate film was not only flammable but also "self-oxidising," meaning once it caught fire, it could continue to burn even without an external oxygen supply.

A Legacy of Fire

The site is defined by two major historical fires that local residents still recall.

The first, and most devastating, occurred during the height of the film distribution era. Witnesses at the time described the sight of "reels of film melting into rivers of fire" as the vaults collapsed. The intensity of the chemical burn made it one of the most dangerous call-outs for the Dublin Fire Brigade in that era.

The building remained in a state of partial use and eventual dereliction until a second major fire occurred years later. On a Saturday evening in late August 2008, the building—then a derelict shell once used for film storage—was engulfed in a massive "Level 3" fire. The Dublin Fire Brigade fought the blaze from both the Upper Abbey Street and Great Strand Street sides. The heat was so intense that the Luas Red Line had to be suspended, and the interior floors, weakened by decades of neglect and the previous historical film fires, gave way entirely. For the next ten years, the site remained a "gap" in the city's skyline, shielded by hoarding until the Marriott development finally broke ground.

The Modern Transformation: Project Ash

Today, the site is being reborn. The Project Ash development, led by Bennett Construction, is a dual-hotel project designed to bridge the gap between Upper Abbey Street and Great Strand Street.

The development consists of two distinct wings:

The Abbey Street Wing: This will house a Courtyard by Marriott hotel. Reaching 11 storeys high, it will provide approximately 252 guest rooms and a significant retail presence at street level.

The Great Strand Street Wing: Fronting the quieter Great Strand Street, this 10-storey building will become a Residence Inn. This part of the project is designed as an aparthotel, featuring roughly 222 rooms tailored for longer stays.

Between these two towers, a new pedestrian link and over 1,600 square metres of retail and restaurant space will be created, finally stitching this historic block back into the fabric of Dublin’s busy commercial district.

___

___