Architect Valerie Mulvin: 'Let's turn the lights back on in our towns'
The Source, Thurles, Co Tipperary, by McCullough Mulvin Architects.
Valerie Mulvin thinks cinematically.
The celebrated architect also has a vision for our towns. Valerie’s rapid-fire conversation projects a mind-movie where Irish streets segue into sets and soundstages for a life with a beguiling Fellini-esque draw.
In her project The Reason of Towns, which won a Royal Institute of the Architects of Ireland (RIAI) award, she regards the urban landscapes as characters in themselves.
I’m curious as to how someone so visual actually sees our towns — are they men, women, children? “They’re gender-neutral,” is the immediate answer. “And — I wouldn’t say they’re ageless — they’re timeless.”
Reviving our towns and buildings is top of her agenda. “The most sustainable building is the one you already have,” she says.
It’s all about context, she adds. “Take a Fellini film — look at the characters in them, the men, the women, the children. They’re getting on with their lives. But in the background, there’s a context. The men are looking at the women, the women are looking at the men.
“That wouldn’t happen in a housing estate.”
Is it a question of making our towns alluring? “It’s about making them active,” says Valerie. “Unlocking the housing. Let’s turn the lights on, get people back in there.
“How did towns work? They used to work really well. They were an environment for our lives.”
“I grew up in Bray, and our town was the background to our lives,” she says.
“I knew the prom, the main street. Some of that has to do with the material character, the materiality.”
After graduating in architecture from UCD in 1981, Valerie spent a year in Rome on a postgraduate scholarship, studying the city’s layers of history.
And of course, there’s scarcely a landmark in the Italian capital without an association with Federico Fellini.
Back in Dublin, Valerie co-founded McCullough Mulvin Architects with her husband, the late Niall McCullough, in 1986.
The practice focuses on the design of sustainable cultural, educational and civic buildings, with an interest in innovative contemporary architecture, place, and history.
Notable buildings in Ireland and internationally include Trinity College Long Room Hub and Printing House Square Student Housing; Crow’s Nest Student Accommodation in Cork; Beaufort Maritime Research Laboratory UCC; Child and Adolescent Psychiatric Unit Bessboro, Cork; Waterford Fire Station; Butler Gallery and Medieval Mile Museum in Kilkenny and the Learning Laboratory in Thapar University, India.
Valerie is currently working on a series of critical buildings in Dublin at 11 Parnell Square, the old Fever Hospital on Infirmary Road and the Old Library in Trinity College.
She now lives in Ranelagh, which she loves. “It’s cyclable and walkable from town,” she says.
As the keynote speaker at the 2025 RIAI conference this week, Valerie addressed its theme, Cities, Towns, Neighbourhoods: Our cities, towns and neighbourhoods form the bedrock of our society, culture and economy.
She also spoke of the exhibition she spearheaded.
The Reason of Towns involves models of buildings in towns from former years, films, documents and drawings, as well as salvage items or what Valerie calls “fragments”. “It said to people, Look, this is all part of our material heritage,” says Valerie.
“In France and Spain, all the elements of their buildings are still there, all the plaster, for instance — and we’re getting rid of all that in a mad dash — modern is always better. For me personally, how do we think about the environment, heritage buildings?”
Interventions in a particular town in the project included ideas such as living over the shop, using spaces such as the garage, or semi-industrial spaces. “The last aspect was to rebuild the town’s market house, which had been demolished in the 1960s, rent it, and have meetings on the first floor,” she says.
An architect’s work is about “placemaking”, she believes. “All through our lives,” says Valerie.
Valerie’s oeuvre — which includes a number of significant projects across Cork and the wider Munster region — is deeply rooted in the cultural, social, and architectural fabric of Irish towns and cities. In addition to her built work, she’s widely respected for her research, writing, and exhibitions exploring the evolving role of urban centres.
An award-winning architect who has delivered innovative, conservation, adaptation and reuse of historic buildings in our towns and cities — contributing hugely to their vibrancy, her built work, including many projects in Cork and across Munster, is complemented by her research, writing and exhibitions on towns and cities.
Her work on the arts centre The Source in Thurles, Co Tipperary, is a source of pride. “We raised the building, put the car park at a higher level, a resource for the whole town,” she says.
Her husband was influential in the student housing and Printing House Square project, she adds. “It releases housing that students would otherwise be occupying,” she says.
There are three directors in the office, and each takes charge of a particular building, she says. “That person has a team that works with them that has three or four people. When you’re right down in the weeds, you can lose perspective.
“We’ve such a great team of 20 or so — there’s wonderful buzz and it’s a great environment to work in. For architects, it’s really important to be in the office or on-site. It’s a great kind of tumble of things that are going on all the time. We enjoy it all.”
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