Architects appointed for landmark Limerick office development

The Opera site will have capacity for up to 3,000 employees

Coady Architects have been appointed to design the six-storey One Opera Square building. Pictured L-R Kevin Mullery, Punch Consulting, Tomás Sexton, Coady Architects, David Conway, CEO Limerick Twenty Thirty and Natasha Corduff, Site Health and Safety. Picture: Arthur Ellis.

Architects have been appointed to design the six-storey One Opera Square building in Limerick's city centre.

Coady Architects (COADY) will carry out the design work on the new building from the corner of Michael Street and Ellen Street. Making the announcement, the firm said the development will boost the visual dynamic of Limerick's city centre and its ability to win significant inward investment.

COADY has partnered with Woods Bagot, a global architectural practice, who have expertise in complex and large scale city centre regeneration projects while the civil and structural engineers are Limerick-based Punch Consulting Engineers.

Artist impression of how the new Opera Centre will look.

One Opera Square is one of six parcels within the wider Opera site project. It will be a modern office building with a gross area of 14,649sqm providing five floors of flexible commercial office space over ground level that will consist of retail, convenience store and café/restaurant. COADY who also designed Treasury Dock in Dublin's North Wall Quay and the CERC building at University Hospital Limerick will also design the entire basement, which will knit the entire campus underground.

The 1.62hectare site will, when fully developed, have the capacity for up to 3,000 employees across a 450,000 sq ft campus accommodation. The programme will take up to six years to complete at an estimated cost of €250m. The construction programme will see up to 500 people employed at peak output on the site.

Tomás Sexton, Director with COADY said: “The Opera Site is going to change the whole look and feel of Limerick city centre and One Opera Square is going to be a key element of that."

"It is a superb opportunity to provide large scale, Grade A office accommodation that is not currently available in the city. It will, in the process, strengthen Limerick’s ability to attract major investment and employment into the city.

David Conway, CEO of Limerick Twenty Thirty: “Little did we think when the Opera site received planning permission in February of last year what was about to unfold, that we would have so much of last year wiped out and spend the first four months plus of this year also in lockdown.

“But as we start to emerge now from Covid, we’re fortunate in Limerick to have such a monumental development beginning."