Working with your Town and Neighbourhood
Towns, villages, and neighbourhoods can be great places to live, work and enjoy a healthy lifestyle. To support those involved in the regeneration or creation of such places, we have put together this page with information and free online resources.
Architects are trained to consider design holistically. An architect with urban design skills is involved in analysing places and identifying opportunities. This process leads to strategies that reimagine and revitalise places, based on their individual qualities, to create a people-centred environment.
Architects can engage with the community, develop innovative solutions and co-ordinate a wide range of specialists involved in urban regeneration. An important part of the role of the architect is to listen and to develop a shared vision.
The RIAI has developed a number of resources with the support of our RIAI Urban Design Committee, such as our Town and Village Toolkit and Special Awards in the Tidy Towns Awards.
RIAI Town and Village Toolkit
Towns and villages across Ireland have been integral to Irish economic and cultural life for centuries. They can also be great places to live and work for modern lifestyles. This free online resource, developped by the RIAI, with support from the Government Policy on Architecture, supports those involved in Irish towns and villages.
The RIAI Town and Village Toolkit provides practical advice, references and successful case studies of places that have overcome challenges with architectural urban design expertise. Case studies include Clonakilty, Cloughjordan, Westport, Tuppercurry and Waterford’s Viking Triangle.
RIAI Town Challenge Award for TidyTowns
The RIAI is delighted to support the great work of the TidyTowns committees with the RIAI Town Challenge Award. This award have been developed with support from the RIAI Urban Design Committee.
This award provides the services of an Architect to work with a local TidyTowns Committee to create a visionary urban design solution to a problem in your town. If a town or village has difficulties, for example, with derelict sites, signage, poor quality public space, traffic or parking issues, an Architect with urban design skills will develop a design vision that can enhance the quality of space in a town or village.
Caption: Proposal for Dungloe Town by Pasparakis Friel Architects, the 2019 Winner of an RIAI Special TidyTowns Award
Previous winners and projects are:
A project for Arklow TidyTowns Committee by Studio idir
A project for Mulranny TidyTowns Committee by Brock Finucane
A project for Oranmore TidyTowns Committee by Louise Cotter MRIAI, Carr Cotter & Naessens Architects
A project for Castlegregory TidyTowns Committee by David Williams MRIAI, Wrkshop Architects
10 Top Tips for Designing Outdoor Living Spaces
The RIAI and the RIAI Urban Design Committee have partnered with Chambers Ireland on this timely guide, which provides 10 Top Tips for Designing Outdoor Living Spaces ahead of the re-opening. This guide offers useful tips on how to make the most of the outdoor space available to businesses and the wider community for the coming months as we embrace outdoor spaces.
Old Town New Place
Old Town New Place is produced by the RIAI with support from the National Policy on Architecture. Based on interviews with Architects and those involved in conservation and heritage in local authorities, the film by Ros Kavanagh tells how five towns – Clonakilty, Ramelton, Naas, Stradbally and Dun Laoghaire – have been transformed for their communities through quality architecture and urban design interventions. The film features an extensive interview with the late Bob Hannan MRIAI (1967-2023) who led many visionary architecture and urban design projects for Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council.
Creating a Vision for a Town or Neighbourhood - RIAI Design Reviews
To support towns and urban neighbourhoods undergoing urban regeneration, the RIAI has developed a Design Review process.
An RIAI Design Review enables communities to benefit from architectural expertise and innovation from the start of a project. Responding to a comprehensive briefing from the community, client and stakeholders, a Design Review panel of Registered Architects creates individual high-level visions and proposals for the project site.
The primary benefits of this process are that it is independent and non-directional and the resultant vision and development ambitions for the project are open and far-reaching.
Past RIAI Design Reviews include:
- Colbert Station Area Quarter, Limerick for the Land Development Agency
- Sandy Road, Galway for the Land Development Agency
- Bantry Harbour, Co. Cork for the Port of Cork Company
- Tivoli, Cork City for the Port of Cork Company
- Castlebar Military Barracks for Mayo County Council
- Kilkenny Diageo / Smithwicks site for Kilkenny City and County Council
- Phibsborough Urban Realm for Phizzfest
If you are interested in carrying out a RIAI Design Review or would like to find out more, please contact Dr. Sandra O’Connell, RIAI Director of Architecture and Communications.
Online Resources
RIAI Town and Village Toolkit, which has a wealth of resources and information.
Town and Village Renewal Scheme
A Framework for Town Centre Renewal, published April 2017
Scotland's Towns Partnership
Putting Town Centres First
Community-led Village Design Statements
IAF Reimagine Place
Free Market
Conservation
Guidelines for the Management and Development of Architectural Conservation Areas, Cork County Council Heritage Unit
Department of Culture, Heritage and the Gaeltacht, Creative Ireland and the RIAI, Old House New Home – What the Buildings Told Us
Further reading
Patrick & Maura Shaffrey, Buildings of Irish Towns – Treasures of Everyday Architecture, Dublin: O’Brien Press
Shopfronts Sean Rothery, The Shops of Ireland, London: Quarto Publishing Group UK, 2009
Town: Origins, Morphology & Future' by Orla Murphy (2012)
Contact us
If you would like to find out more about ‘Working with an Architect’ in your town or neighbourhood, contact the RIAI.