Architect Simon Walker is trying to save a Ballsbridge house designed by his late father, the RIAI gold medal winner Robin Walker of Scott Tallon Walker. He has submitted an appeal to An Bord Pleanála in a bid to stop the redevelopment of number 58 Heytesbury Lane which he believes will "effectively destroy" the house. The house, which he says is "an important part of our architectural heritage", is only one of two domestic commissions undertaken by Robin Walker. The other is the 1960s-built O'Flaherty house in Kinsale, Co Cork, which is a protected structure and which earned him one of his two RIAI gold medals. The house was commissioned by George Hetherington, a former managing director of Hely Thom printers. Walker says the Ballsbridge house is "of equal quality" to the Kinsale house but is not as well known and has requested that it be included on the Register of Protected Structures. His application for inclusion on the register has been seconded by the Irish branch of Docomomo, the international organisation for the preservation of modernist architecture.
