Ireland punching above its weight in design, too
By: John Lee | Published Friday, December 21, 2012, 1:16 PM | Updated Friday, December 21, 2012, 1:16 PM
Curse you shimmering, trend-setting Frank Gehry designed
museum in Bilbao. Curse you gorgeous seaside and mountains setting of
Cape Town with your peppy BRICSA economy. Dublin is right back at you with its new Kevin Roche designed
Convention Centre and so much more! Ireland has been pulling off a few upsets in international sporting competition (rugby, okay, but cricket?), and has already confound the odds by making the shortlist of three, along with Bilbao and Cape Town, for the international designation in 2014 of “World Design Capital,” an honor previously bestowed on Seoul and Torino and which will next go to Helsinki.
The vision of the World Design Capital project is to promote and encourage the use of design to further the social, economic and cultural development of the world’s cities. As a World Design Capital, designated cities have the opportunity to showcase accomplishments in design and urban policy and can expect to:
· gain visibility as a center for creativity and innovation
· attract investment and creative people
· stimulate new partnerships
· strengthen knowledge-based economic development
· improve the quality of life in the city
· position the city as a leading center of design
· build global image as a must-see travel destination
· take part in an international network of design
· foster citizen pride in their city’s accomplishments
On the World Design Capital website here’s how Dublin is described:
“A city of one million people, Dublin is a hospitable, lively and eccentric city known to be open to ideas and creativity. With its wide connectivity and strategic geographical location, the capital of Ireland has become a busy crossing point for global flows of people and investment, as well as an international hub for large technology companies such as Facebook, Google, Intel, Microsoft and IBM. With its unique design heritage, the Unesco City of Literature is host for influential and distinguished design events such as the ATypI 2010 conference and the World Craft Council Europe conference in 2011.”
City of Literature? Sure… but design? Writer Mick Heaney lays out the case for a burgeoning Irish design sensibility in an excellent Irish Times article called
“Look of the Irish: why we're now a visual culture.” After acknowledging that many thought even to place a bid in the competition was foolhardy, he wrote, “But things are changing. The visual imagination is not only alive and well in modern Ireland but is arguably more vibrant than some its more illustrious creative cousins.”
He looks beyond “official art” and sees, “There has been a surge of grassroots activity, with young artists staking out creative territory in exciting new ways…Visual creativity in Ireland is thriving across a host of areas, from fashion and graphics to animation and video games.”
No surprise he’d note the heritage of the Book of Kells, but he also recalled a new design sensibility that fell from the skies, when he referenced the observations of Professor Luke Gibbons on the “strong look created by Aer Lingus in the 1960s and beyond, from its livery to its uniforms and posters, which not only promoted the airline but projected a definite idea of Ireland: bright and friendly, homely and green.”
Ireland’s World Design Capital bid is called PIVOT Dublin 2014 and it states its case eloquently at its –what do you expect?--
creatively designed website:
“PIVOT Dublin is our response to Dublin’s unleashed potential to use design as the vehicle to turn things inside out; to become something else. We want Dublin to become World Design Capital 2014…‘PIVOT Dublin’ is a declaration of our intent to offer Dublin as a test-bed for design solutions to local, national and global challenges. A pivot creates a departure point, a fulcrum, an angle from which to proceed. It is a step in the process of lining up for the next move. It suggests success, urgency and decisiveness… Dublin, from swerve of shore to bend of bay, is design. In 2014, PIVOT Dublin will turn design inside out.”
Fingers crossed on Oct. 26!
MEDIA PINGS: An example of an Irish native taking design to new heights goes on view this week at the
Museum of the City of New York in an exhibit called
Kevin Roche: Architecture as Environment,” a retrospective of the career of the Irish born architect best known in New York for the
Ford Foundation building and in Dublin for the aforementioned Convention Center (photo above)…Irish visual arts in the form of six contemporary films are showcased in
Irish Film New York, Sept. 30-Oct. 2…the arts take the stage at the first-Tuesday-of-the-month
Salons of the Irish American Writers & Artists at the Thalia Café on 95th and Broadway, 7-9PM, and the same group holds its annual
Eugene O’Neill Award Celebration on Mon., Oct. 17 when they honor Irish Repertory Theatre founders Charlotte Moore and Ciarán O’Reilly with a Tiffany trophy presented by
Gabriel Byrne…for a great way to track all New York’s many Irish arts events check out the scrolling calendar at the
NewYorkIrishArts blog...
3 Comments
-
-
-
Switch to the desktop site to post a comment.jacersagain | Sep 27, 2011, 04:19 PM EDT
Kudos to John Lee for highlighting the design qualities of Irish Architects, Interior Designers and Cultural Designers! Might I also highlight that Dublin has a unique attraction/event on the weekend 7th-9th October next, called Open House Dublin. It allows members of the Public (including tourists in town) to visit for free, yes - FREE - many public and normally private fine houses and buildings all around the city and environs. They can see and explore them for themselves, many with free guided tours, and some by the owners of the fine private homes being opened to the public in the city for the event. It will open your eyes to Dublin’s grand houses, private homes and public, civic and commercial buildings. Such an experience will no doubt help the PIVOT Dublin campaign to be the World Design Capital 2014. Visit the openhousedublin website for more info. Get out there and visit these beautifully designed buildings and their interiors - and enjoy aspects of my Dear Oul’ Dublin Town that you wouldn’t normally be allowed to get into...
aligrehan | Sep 26, 2011, 05:13 PM EDT
Thanks guys for the coverage. As the person who's been leading the Pivot Dublin project from the beginning, I can say that we've put our heart and soul into it. Dublin design is world class and the purpose of our bid for World Design Capital is to demonstrate this. It's a story that we need to tell ourselves as well as the world. Trealach is correct about Irish people being to the forefront of global humanitarian work and this network is being harnessed by Pivot Dublin. See Dochas testimonial on our brilliant website www.pivotdublin.com
Trealach | Sep 26, 2011, 02:29 PM EDT
Why does the headline suggest "surprise". Ireland has always punched above it's weight, that's what makes us the Greatest Country in the World - we just don't shout about it. We are Number 1 (per capita) in the Guinness Book of Records and in 10th place globally. Since the foundation of the UN, we are the ONLY country in the world, where an Irish person is on foreign soil EVERY DAY OF THE WEEK either helping to Prevent a Disaster, or helping AFTER a disaster. So why should this article be so surprising?