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PLACE & SPACE
The Bloom Fringe Team becomes the Green Edge Team and there are exciting times ahead
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he differences and similarities between what a place is and what changes city spaces have intrigued and inspired us as designers for many years. As Jan Gehl, the renowned public space expert once said, “If you design for cars you get cars, while if you design for people you will get people”. Our response as city dwellers has been to create events to green our concreted spaces and bring people into these spaces, to turn them into places in which to linger and make memories afterwards. It has been an incredible journey and we have made tons of friends since our first gig in 2014. Our work explores the power of temporary use to showcase change and how we can make cities more liveable.
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We don’t like to stay still for too long so we are now taking the opportunity through Horticulture Connected to announce some big changes. First up, we are moving our festival to September. We will have more time now to nail our 2018 programme. Next thing is a name change; we are now called Green Edge. These decisions were not taken lightly - Bloom Fringe has been such a rewarding project to work on for all three of us Róisín de Buitléar, Esther Gerrard and myself Marion Keogh. We feel a weight has been lifted with these changes, and that the hustle for sponsorship and press coverage will be less competitive now.
L E G A C Y We work solidly on the festival every year for about 12 weeks and the projects that stay on the streets afterwards that
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“While passion doesn’t pay the bills it does fuel us” turn it into a legacy. 2014 had green wall panels activating the laneways, 2015 saw the Thornton’s skip seats popping up all around the city and around the country. 2016 had a willow woven castle sculpture which was left in Dublin Castle for the summer. In 2017, our flowery wheelbarrows and timber planters were moved from Wolfe Tone Square to a neighbouring piece of pathway on Wolfe Tone Street as a small greening project. Ensuring community champions are supported and projects are implemented takes time, and we hope to achieve many more lasting legacy projects with Green Edge.
S U P P O R T We have always maintained a hard line on where our financial support comes from. Our principal sponsor has been Dublin City Council, with partners and supporters such as Fáilte Ireland, OPW at Dublin Castle, Sanctuary Synthetics, Mulch, and Powerscourt Townhouse helping us out. It’s not always money that comes our way but stuff too - old wheelbarrows, artificial grass, fabric offcuts, plants, chairs, coffee, food, all donated to us in exchange for a Tweet or a Facebook meme and a place on our map and a feature in our films. Our map, designed by Fuchsia MacAree, is distributed to 10,000 Dubliners and visitors. It’s a pull-out colourful funky guide to the community gardens, secret gardens, retailers and coffee shops that are all taking part in the festival.
/ www.horticultureconnected.ie / Spring 2018
