The good, the bad and the ugly in rural design

THE PRODUCT of two years’ work and an integral part of the new County Development Plan, the much-awaited Rural Design Guide, by Cork County Council, is due for release in the first week of January 2004.

In the foreword, authors John Clements from the Planning Policy Unit and county architect Billy Houlihan stress the significance of our buildings, not just in the preservation of our existing, vernacular stock, but in creating positive additions to our environment for the generations to come.

New buildings, they say, should not be an imitation of what's already been created, but should be adaptable to modern living and reflect the location, character and materials of their particular area.

The countryside is one of our most valuable assets, the design guide states, with a wealth that has a value not only in tangible economic terms but also in cultural terms. The most obvious part of this inheritance is our built environment, which is 'as important to our cultural identity as our language, music and literature.'

Cork County Council is charged with preserving this heritage while also monitoring projects that are happening in the 21st century. To reconcile these twin aims, the book pays tribute to the vernacular, but offers modern and sustainable design alternatives that don't fall into the trap of being mere pastiche.

The need for the guide is necessary, Clements and Houlihan say, because our increasing prosperity has seen more houses built here since the beginning of the property boom than at any other time since the famine.

Planning departments, it could be said, have been swamped since the mid 1990s by a tsunami of applications for one-off rural houses.

In the '90s, big was in and Ensuite Ireland was born of a construction frenzy which saw, 'extremely unimaginative standards of domestic rural house design' prevail,' as Clements and Houlihan describe it.

And, while Seán and Síle Citizen may have been at fault for the neo-Tudor, five bed with topiaried gardens, then the town planner without a design background also has to carry the can for the 'inappropriate' architecture which now dots our countryside.

And that begs the question what is and is not appropriate?

The 'Look at Me' imperative that has driven the building of big, show-off houses could be explained in the context of an unprecedented economic boom. We never had it so good was the attitude that prevailed against a backdrop of astronomic property increases.

Now in the fiscal sobriety of the noughties, and with the property boom at cruising, rather than breakneck speed, we at long last have time to consider our priorities in a First World rather than Boom Town manner.

And it's at just this point that the council come in with their new guide, aimed at a population that have already been softened-up by stricter area controls and the ongoing media war between proponents and opponents of one-off rural houses.

With minds thus focused, the twin mantras of Simplicity and Modesty / Less is More, which could be described as the concise version of this guide, should find some purchase.

And it's not just us, the plain people who are the focus of this excellent production, but also our aiders and abetters, the architects and engineers and also, the arbiters, the end-line planners who also need to sing from the same hymn sheet.

The Rural Design Guide is a blueprint for us all, but it doesn't hand it to you on a plate you have to make an informed decision based on all the factors outlined within its pages.

However, if there is one aspiration coming through clearly then it's that we use respect when building in the countryside.

Respect for the past: the neo-Tudor brick mansard is not a descendant of the two-storey farmhouse.

Respect for the land: follow the contours, don't bulldoze your way through it and don't dominate the skyline or seashore.

Respect for the environment by building unobtrusive, sustainable and well orientated houses that are warm and bright.

John Clements is at pains to point out that guide is not prescriptive the council will not tell you what you can and cannot build, but want to guide you gently through the right choices.

Should you persist in the wrong direction, of course, you won't get planning permission that's the bottom line.

Cork Rural Design Guide Volume One is available though Cork County Council's offices and selected outlets.

Price: €20.00 with €5.00 post and packaging.