Champions of the Environment.

Specifically, champions don’t automatically emerge. They emerge because history and numerous supports encourage them to, nurture them through trying times, celebrate their successes, and nurse them through occasional failures. But given the supports, the would-be champion population turns out to be enormous, certainly not limited to a handful of creative marvels.

A quote taken from, Thomas J. Peters, In Search of Excellence.

What passes for a spatial and environmental design tradition here in Ireland, is just a ‘handful of creative marvels’. The bias is clearly presented in the AAI Design Awards brochure, which aims to drive home a message, that to be a designer, you must also be superhuman. I see this as a huge stumbling block, in the process of trying to build a foundation for Environmental and Spatial Design in Ireland. A foundation, from which the country could grow in the future. Disiplines, that make up the broad mass of spatial and environmental design, tend to view things through their own eyeglass. Something much broader is called for. Something that will widen the discussion, and include humble projects such as Archiseek underneath it’s wing. Archiseek, is a project, trying to foster communication between different environmental design segments, both professional and non-professional. I am amazed at it’s sucess so far, even using limited bandwidth and a simple interface. I think, it is time though to start expanding from the lessons learned at Archiseek. Because, our current structures, the ‘Planning Process’ included, have not embraced the value of communication. More is the pity I say.

Brian O’ Hanlon.