The Irish Times

It's been a good year, if not a great one, for architecture and urban design in Ireland. And, significantly, the best projects realised during 2000 were planned long before we had so much money sloshing around the place, with all the appalling vulgarity it has spawned. Economic booms do not, in general, produce an architectural legacy of real quality. Everyone is too busy and there's little time to think, let alone reflect, on whether a particular design concept represents the best possible solution. Corners are cut and mediocrity tends to triumph. Really good buildings will always be exceptional, whatever the economic conditions of an era. But despite signs that some private developers are raising their game, it is in the public sector that real strides are being made, particularly by some of the more progressive local authorities.