MrEmmett Scanlon

Emmett Scanlon is an architect, graduating with a Masters of Architecture from UCD in 2000. He was born in Damascus, Syria and lives in Dublin, Ireland and Paris, France.

His creative and design practice in architecture ranges across building and spatial design, public art, exhibition making and curation, research, education and writing. Behind all of this work is a commitment to making architecture accessible, strengthening its social and cultural relevance.

In independent practice since 2006, Emmett was Project Director at Grafton Architects, working there for ten years.

In 2018 he was Assistant to the Curators, Shelley Mc Namara and Yvonne Farrell, for FREESPACE, the 16th International Architecture Exhibition, Venice. Emmett has also curated exhibitions in Dublin, Kilkenny, and London.

He is the host and producer of the podcast What Buildings Do which is now the most popular podcast on this subject produced in Ireland. The podcast was the first part of the Story, Building platform established in 2021. The first book of the new platform, Foreign Exchange, was published in 2022.

Emmett is Assistant Professor in Architecture at University College Dublin. In 2021 he was awarded a University Teaching and Learning Award, the first such award at that level made to a practice-based Professor of Architecture at UCD.

Emmett was Architecture Adviser to the Arts Council (Ireland) between 2006 and 2020. He worked on arts and national policy for architecture and was instrumental in developing new research and new funding streams and initiatives to support architects’ creative practice and to build new audiences for architecture.

Emmett remains an advocate for opportunities for architects to develop their creative practices and for greater inclusion of all people in discussions and processes of architecture design, production and use.

In 2020 Emmett was Production Designer on Where We Live, the flagship festival of ThisIsPopBaby, one of Ireland’s most creative and celebrated theatre companies. He is an associate artist with the company for 2022.