Tracy Gilbert Designs launches 1916 Collection

As we all know, 2016 marks 100 years since the Easter Rising and the reading of the Proclamation of the Irish Republic on the steps of Dublin’s GPO. There are many events to mark the occasion taking place all across the country. The national papers, TV and Radio channels have invested steeply in commemorating the important year of 1916.

As a designer and a lover of Irish history/mythology, I felt that I needed to design something to mark this important milestone in Irish history. Ireland wouldn’t be the Ireland we know and love without the events of the Easter Rising in 1916.

So how do you design something to mark this occasion? The profiles of the signatories of the proclamation were widespread when I started to design the pieces. I wanted to do something different. I played around with my Growing Home design to see if it could be tweaked. But it just wasn’t enough. I sketched, I researched and let my mind play with many ideas but none of which I felt captured that important snapshot of Irish history well.

It was about 3 o’clock in the morning and the names of signatories were running through my head. All of a sudden, I had a feeling that the word “IRELAND” could be formed by aligning them in a certain way. I grabbed my iPad, opened word and that was the beginning of my 1916 Collection

So what is the design trying to say about the seven signatories (MacDiarmada, Pearse, Ceannt,    Plunkett, Clarke, Connolly and MacDonagh) and the events leading up to the reading of the Proclamation? In not so many words, the design represents that it simply must have been the signatories destiny to forge modern Ireland together – why else can Ireland be formed from their surnames?

My 1916 Collection is a limited edition and is available as a pendant, cufflinks and tie/lapel-pin.