Architecture

Cathal Mcloughlin

This year the Architecture Society wanted to realign itself towards our shared interests in architecture and design and encourage younger students to become engaged in architectural discourse

This year, the Society has continued our guest lecture series, where we invite architects, designers and activists to the college. These lectures have sparked debate, discussion and activism within the Society and provide a social setting where students gather together on Tuesday evenings. Lectures of note this year were architectural activists Frank O’Connor and Jude Sherry of Anois and Orla Egan of the Cork LGBT Archive The Society endeavoured to sustain this kind of student engagement and interest by organising two larger scale events that would become part of our Anti-Dereliction campaign. The first of these events is the ‘24hr Charette’ dereliction protest, where students spent the night in our satellite campus brainstorming solutions to Cork City’s dereliction crisis. The second was the ‘2023 Symposium: The Future of Cork City’, where students engaged in both a day of discussion and debate and active workshops held by architects and city actors

We have also provided several social events, including two table quizzes, socials, Bake Sale, and our leading Social Event - The Architecture Ball, which this year was in collaboration with UCC’s Planni

The Society engaged in various forms of protest and debate this year and offered students a platform to share and discuss their thoughts on architectural-related matters. The success of the Society is seen through our Dereliction Campaign, for which we got nominated for a BICS award We also achieved great success with the UCC Society awards, winning Best Poster, Best SEFFS event, and Best Campaign, as well as being nominated for Best Photo and Best Social Media.

The Society hopes that next year’s committee will continue its work in architecture and design and will continue to highlight the dereliction crises and other architectural related crises through the form of active protest Furth, it would be great to see the UCCs Architecture Society connect with other architecture societies throughout Ireland, join forces, and highlight such topics collectively through various forms.