The new generation of Irish-Chinese want to make their mark. A fledgling network of Asian architects hopes to integrate the cultures with a Chinatown in Dublin, writes Richard Conway.

The sketch jumps off the page. It's Dublin's city centre, but not as we know it. Decorative paper lanterns hang from glass-fronted buildings, dragon statuettes adorn slick shop entrances and large Mandarin characters bedeck restaurant awnings.

It's a little bit of China in the heart of Dublin. Well, it's more like a theoretical bit of China in the heart of Dublin. This is the work of the Chinese Institute of the Architects and Designers of Ireland (CIAI) - a collection of three Chinese and Malaysian architects, and one accountant, eager to get noticed.

The group is the brainchild of 27-year-old architect and Chinese national Chao Chen. Chen, who works for Dublin architectural practice Gilroy McMahon, says he formed the group because Chinese people in Ireland have little or no representation on issues of culture and design.

"We want to wave a flag for a new generation of Irish-Chinese, to create a dialogue between old Irish culture and new Irish culture. The group is a stage for Chinese and Irish people to talk about what they want."

Chen says the Chinese community here is "growing up and starting to organise themselves", and that the CIAI is just one part of this. "Our group wants to use design and architecture to get noticed, to be visible."

Despite Ireland's recognition of Chinese higher education qualifications coming into play last February, Chen thinks many Chinese, and other Asians, are working in jobs they are vastly overqualified to do. Now he wants his network to allow them to "use their skills", and he says the time is right to showcase his community's talented masses.

"For many years Chinese people who come here had to give up their careers. They cannot do what they did at home. But there is so much talent. I know a guy who has an industrial design degree in China but who works in a factory here."

Interior architects Lan Chen (27) and Shiow Hui Yee (23), and the group's accountant, Jing Kang (27), say their network is important because it represents a new direction for the Chinese in Ireland: the forming of organised, educated collectives who want to tackle issues facing their culture.

"We want people to learn about China and to make an impact on our second home. People don't really know what we do here. Irish people don't know China really," says Chinese national Lan Chen, a graduate of Griffith College in Dublin. "They think 'food, chippers, curries', but that's not it. There is so much more. There's design, fashion, language and history, too."

Lan Chen believes that in a quickly changing Ireland, it's important that Irish and Chinese cultures understand each other. Her culture is not about people working in restaurants, she says, just as much as ours isn't about Riverdance. But she worries about the Chinese being born here and is concerned her community may be faced with a culturally detached young generation.

"They will probably go to an Irish school. But what if we want to bring them to a Chinese school or even better, a mixed school?"

Shiow Hui Yee, who is Malaysian- Chinese and also studied at Griffith, says that the CIAI represents a turning point in Irish history. There are hordes of professionally trained Chinese graduating all over Ireland who have ideas about how to help shape the country.

But she worries about the "separation" from Irish culture that the generation above her experience; and the detachment from Chinese culture the one below her may face.

"My aunt's children don't know Chinese at all. They can't write. But my aunt doesn't know English very well. So communication between them is not very good." She wants to see schools in Ireland teaching Chinese or maybe even Chinese schools teaching Irish and English.

"Right now, my cousin sends her children back to Malaysia to learn Chinese, because my family speaks Chinese. They go for four years and then they come back to continue their education. It would be better if they could do that here."

And the CIAI has plans to make that happen. It wants Dubliners to consider an idea that has long been a talking point in their community: a brand new Chinatown, replete with schools, museums, shops and restaurants.

They want to design and plan it from scratch, to create a new urban district that not only acts as a centre for the Chinese community but also integrates the Irish community.

"We would like it to be in Smithfield. But it could be anywhere," says Chao Chen. "We would like to approach landowners and developers with it. But it's not just for us. It's for Irish people, too."

Chen admits it would be an uphill struggle - there isn't much of Dublin city centre left to develop. And with their sights set on somewhere like Smithfield, they'd probably come up against a myriad of planning laws.

Would it not be easier to further develop parts of Parnell Street, often dubbed Dublin's de facto Chinatown?

"Parnell Street is a window on China, buts it's small window," says Chen. "That area is filled with just businesses and restaurants, which creates only a weak relationship with Irish people."

If the group got the go-ahead, it would plan to include Irish-Chinese "cultural buildings" so "understanding would be stable," he says.

But what exactly is an Irish-Chinese cultural building? And how would designing a distinct Chinese or Asian area integrate two cultures?

"The purpose is not to create a Chinese Chinatown; it's to create an Irish-Chinese Chinatown," says Shiow Hui Yee. For her, an Irish-Chinese cultural building would be a place that allows everyone to experience the unique "culture of the Chinese in Ireland".

Lan Chen admits that terms like "cultural building" may seem vague and that their plans may seem far-fetched, but she says it's important that they press ahead.

If their Chinatown idea doesn't work out they'll just start entering architectural design competitions. What's most important is that they bring "Chinese design and culture to Ireland".

And as Yee says: "Ten years ago people would just say, 'Chinese people, they work in McDonalds,' but not any more, now we are moving up higher here."