To mark the year of Irish Design 2015 (ID2015), New Horizon_architecture from Ireland is a flagship global initiative, presenting ten emerging Irish practices in three high-profile venues. The architects selected are Clancy Moore, Hall McKnight, Steve Larkin, TAKA and Emmett Scanlon at the London Festival of Architecture; A2, GKMP and Ryan W. Kennihan at the Chicago Architecture Biennial; and AP+E and Urban Agency at the Shenzhen Bi-City Biennale of Urbanism\Architecture.
As Irish Design 2015 Programme Director I was delighted to commission this major project. From its inception, Irish Design 2015 has recognised that design and architecture are allied and interdependent, and this interdisciplinary synthesis is a critical premise under-pinning the programme for the year.
Nine Lives Installation, Architect: Emmet Scanlon, Design Museum London
Connecting creative communities of practice with communities of place, ID2015 describes a space where new ideas, methods and practices can traverse traditional disciplinary boundaries. This year and this flagship architectural show demonstrate how a holistic approach to the design sector builds cultural and economic assets for people, industry and society as a whole.
Building upon a rich legacy of vernacular and internationally informed architectural Irish practice, New Horizon_architecture from Ireland is grounded in a profound engagement with the collaborative potency of architecture. The commissioned projects do not present a narrow, national style, but rather a nuanced series of innovative and provocative explorations that reflect on Irish architecture’s capacity to engage and foster new social narratives, in the context of local and global change.
Creative collaboration is a permanent work in progress; it is a collective process made and remade, revised and reiterated, reinterpreted and reimagined. New Horizon is an architectural laboratory revealing this evolutionary process, presenting, archiving and transforming spaces at a series of public events at architecture festivals and biennales across the globe.
New Horizon showcases a rising generation of Irish architectural talent, with the commissioned projects acting as a point of departure for further debates about the future of architecture, design and the built environment. The pavilions and installations provide a spatial and social platform to bring together the public or professionals, encouraging them to cultivate new ideas, talent and stimulating discussion between Ireland and a global audience.
Red Pavilion, Architects: Clancy Moore, Taka, Steve Larkin
Design must start with concepts and questions. From that position it is enabled to challenge established precepts and socio-cultural, ethical and technical assumptions in order to ensure that we don’t simply play a role in shaping objects, materials and communication for today’s customers, but begin to define the very nature of what society may need, want and desire in the future.
In bringing together these ten architectural practices, Nathalie Weadick and Raymund Ryan curate a conversation that transcends historic disciplinary bandwidth to create an exhibition that shifts the paradigm of architecture from the design of buildings, to becoming a strategic tool in addressing and incorporating society’s concerns.
Yellow Pavilion, Architects: Hall McKnight
Jimmy Deenihan TD, Minister of State for the Diaspora and Alex Milton, ID2015 Programme Director
Irish Design 2015 seeks to champion the highest standards in Irish architecture, design and placemaking, advocating a better understanding of the importance of design in both the public and private sectors. New Horizon presents a transformational moment in Irish architecture for 2015 and beyond.
For further information on the project please visit:
alex milton design 