CURIOSITIES:BLINK, AND YOU might miss it. Which would be a pity, because this is an architectural gem. Although in fairness, despite being an unusual structure, it is easy to miss.
So, next time you are in Kilbeggan, Co Westmeath, keep your eyes peeled for a low, grey-black corrugated concrete structure, nestling beside Locke's Distillery Museum.
Looking like a big, inverted jelly mould, this is one of our best surviving examples of a cheap yet clever building method invented by an Irish engineer. One inspired by rough and ready techniques that soldiers improvised during the first World War.
The grandly named James Hardress de Warrenne Waller was born in 1884, scion of a distinguished Tipperary family. Better known as Jim Waller, he trained as an engineer and, during the war, or so the story goes, watched soldiers camouflage their tents by daubing them with concrete, and realised you could make a building that way. By 1921, he had patented his idea.
First, erect a series of timber ribs or arches, to create a temporary skeleton for your building; cover this with hessian or canvas; apply two or three layers of mortar. And that's it.
The hessian will sag between the ribs, under the weight of mortar, giving the structure a corrugated shape. Once the concrete has dried, you can remove the ribs to leave a self-supporting concrete shell, and the ribs can be reused for the next building.
Waller buildings were quick and cheap, didn't require steel reinforcing, and could be made with locally available materials. Waller himself saw a great future for them, especially in developing countries: with the advent of motor transport, mechanisation and mass production, he envisaged jelly-mould storage and transport depots, farm buildings and aircraft hangars.
The concept enjoyed a certain vogue in the 1940s and 1950s, especially for some quick post-war rebuilding projects when steel was scarce. It was also popular in Africa, for everything from small henhouses to large aircraft hangars. But interest waned in the 1950s and, for now, his buildings remain architectural curiosities.
You'll have to admire Kilbeggan's concrete gem from the outside - Cooley Distillery matures barrels of whiskey in it. But you'll find information about Waller at Locke's Distillery museum (www.lockesdistillerymuseum.ie) and the Irish Architectural Archive, Merrion Square, Dublin.