BUNRATTY interior design graduate Weronika Sliwinska designed a dance studio for her final year project at the Limerick School of Art and Design.
It was a labour of love for Weronika, who was a passionate dancer before illness meant her participation was severely curtailed.
“At the start of the fourth year we were asked to pick, and I picked a dance studio, because when I was eight years old I started dancing, it was ballroom and Latin that I started with. After a few years I moved to Ireland and I kept going, but because of my health condition I had to stop. It is still my passion and I wanted to bring that to interior design. That’s where it all started,” she says.
She still dances a little bit, but there are limits. “When I was dancing my hips were getting really sore, and I needed surgery on both of my hips. After surgery I got back to dancing for a bit but they diagnosed me with rheumatoid arthritis so I kind of stopped fully for a few years, all of my joints were too sore for that kind of activity.”
Her project is based on the Bank Buildings in Belfast. “We were asked to pick a building where we would like to design our project. Most of the girls picked the buildings around us in Limerick, but we couldn’t duplicate. I wanted to go further and I picked a building in Belfast.”
On what she included in her design, she says, “There’s a performance area with rehearsal rooms, for different styles, ballroom and Latin, hip hop, special rehearsal rooms for dancers, a physiotherapy centre for them, a cafe, reception area, waiting area. On top of that I wanted to bring something unique, that isn’t really in any dance studios, so I had a performance area, where dancers could invite their families and friends and perform there, they’d have their own private performance stage.”
She found the final year at LSAD challenging, but really enjoyed working on the project. “It was tough, it was a hard final year, but it was really rewarding as well, to bring my own personal experience to the project.”
Weronika has taken inspiration from her mother in terms of her occupation. “The interior design came from my mother, she’s involved in it, I started helping her and followed this path.”
The Limerick School of Art and Design Graduate Show begins on June 1 and continues until June 9,.
Owen Ryan has been a journalist with the Clare Champion since 2007, having previously worked with a number of other publications in Limerick, Cork and Galway. His first book will be published in December 2024.