What Buildings Do.
What Buildings Do is a podcast about the matter of people and buildings and buildings that matter.
Begun in May 2020, since 2022 it is part of Story,Building a platform for the critical discussion of architecture in Ireland.
Open to new and diverse voices, conversations, and critical perspectives Story, Building aims to explore the value and meaning of architecture in contemporary Ireland. Architecture has been cut adrift from much contemporary discussion. Framed as part of a divisive popular discourse that thrives on click-through headlines and binary, instant-reactions, architecture depends on an image driven media discourse that celebrates the spectacle and the novel, stripping architecture of its social, spatial, and material agency, reality, and opportunity. Intended for both a public and professional audience, Story, Building will unravel, assess, and discuss the terms and conditions under which architecture (in all its forms, by all its constituents) is produced, used, and consumed, its very causes and its effects.
What Buildings Do tends to this editorial position by expanding the conversation on architecture, working to include more voices within it. People are supported to share their lives lived in the company of the built world around them. In this way the podcast seeks to break down the defensive barriers constructed by the profession since its foundation.
36. Story, Building!
A short episode heralding the arrival of Story, Building a new platform for the critical discussion architecture and the new home of the podcast, What Buildings Do.
35. Derek Tynan.
Derek Tynan was a member of Group 91, the team of architects who revolutionised Irish architecture in Temple Bar 30 years ago.
34. Book Review.
Two books up for review - The Dublin Architecture Guide 1937-2021 and The Dignity of Everyday Life. With Noel Bowler + David Capener.
33. Zoë Berman
Zoe was a founding member of Part W an organisation dedicated to calling out all forms of inequality in architecture + built environment.
32. SoilLab.
SoilLab is the Danish representation at the 2021 Chicago Biennial, but includes Irish architects James Albert Martin + Eiblinh Ni Chatasiagh.
31. Ryan W. Kennihan
Ryan is one of Ireland’s leading architects and in the podcast he discusses recent work and a forthcoming monograph on RWKA’s work to date.
30. FAF.
Future Architects Front [FAF] is Charlie Edmonds and Priti Mohandas who wish to advocate better working conditions for young architects.
29. Emma Geoghegan
Emma talks about her personal and professional history with one of Ireland’s most interesting buildings, the former BRAUN factory in Carlow.
28. Will Hurst.
Will is the editor of the Architect’s Journal in the UK, through which he stablished the RetroFit First campaign, advocating for the re-use of buildings.
27. ANNEX
ANNEX represented Ireland at the 17th International Architecture Biennale in Venice, with their work “Entanglement”.
26. S.O.A.
Self Organised Architecture have just published a new document intended to support the development of a new policy for citizen led housing in Ireland.
25. N.E.B.
Orla Murphy outlines the values and workings of the New European Bauhaus and talks about its potential impacts on architecture.
24. Up North.
Northern Ireland is 100 years old on May 3rd 2021. In this podcast Emmett speaks to four people working in architecture in Northern Ireland.