The Casino at Marino

Dublin architectural students of the fifties had a wonderful selection of neo-classical buildings as objects for an exercise in 'measured drawing'. We in Belfast were most impressed at the news that they were 'doing' Chambers' masterpiece of chaste, ice-cool, neo-classicism, The Casino at Marino.There must be quite a lot of surviving pencil drawings on Watman or Sanders hand-made paper of this enigmatic pile. It has the same worldly perfection as its original(this being a replica) but not the tourist-pulling power of its four sided successor, Villa Capra by Palladio. I have often admired the wonderful elevations in Banister-Fletcher but can never remember seeing the plan reproduced to mesmerise us as that of Villa Capra. Perhaps some of the intrepid surveyors will step forward with his or her drawings still readable and with encyclopedic information for us all. It would certainly help my research of the period 1949-50 if some of the students of then remember their days at Marino. William H Orr RIBA M Arch email william.hen@kmutt.ac.th