Ciara Davin McLaughlin

Ciara Davin McLaughlin designs reflect her interest and ideas on social inclusion, environmental issues and sustainability. Aware of the impact living and working environments have on our health, her designs strive to improve not only the functionality but the aesthetic quality of indoor and outdoor spaces and present an alternative solution for people living in towns and cities. Good design and beautiful environments are important for health and wellbeing and should be accessible to everyone.

The place where you live can change the way you behave and whilst architects strive for the utopia of modern high rise living, the reality for many of the inhabitants is a dystopia of poverty and social division. The topic of this investigation focuses on the inequalities of social housing and in particular the architectural designs of high-rise builds in inner cities and how this has the potential for contributing to wealth inequality, social segregation, violence and discord.

An initial research report preludes the problem on how to socially level the high-rise through examining case studies of post war architecture in inner cities and the effect on society’s well-being and behaviour when there are restrictions and barriers to social connectivity. The research and studio practice relate to theoretical studies on the inequalities of social housing. In particular, Jane Jacobs book ‘The Death and Life of Great American Cities’ which examines the flaws in urban renewal and the deconstruction of potentially healthy cities through urban planning.

The study then focuses on the fictional ‘High Rise’ by J.G. Ballard. Using literary interpretations of this novel and the floor plans and set designs in the subsequent film, a graphic analysis of this fictional building was undertaken to establish how the Architect’s vision and design of utopian living descended into a nightmare of chaos and social division.

The High Rise was then redesigned, removing the barriers, both physical and psychological to negate the oppression for the people inside and create a new way of living that connects not only the physical floor levels but also the human diversity of our society. This is established through sketches, sketch book work, experimentation and a portfolio of CAD developments and final design.