Keith Williams Architects has found remarkable success in a series of public buildings in Britain and Ireland. The Wexford Opera House opened to great international acclaim to house Ireland’s premier classical musical festival. The building skilfully handles a complex brief and an extremely tight urban site, simultaneously making its presence felt on the city’s skyline whilst not overwhelming the domestic scale of the streets in which it sits. Williams’ Parallel range was originally designed for another Irish building, Athlone Civic Centre, and its form derives from the architectural language of the brise soleil, which was a prominent feature of that building’s elevational language. The same handles can be seen on the Unicorn Children’s Theatre in London, and on subsequent projects.
