About
Do you ever ask yourself the following questions?
"Were there dinosaurs in Cork?"
"Can you find gold in Cork?"
the study of our beautiful planet – the physical, the dynamics and the history of the Earth.
Cork City has a great geological legacy that is an integral part of the city’s culture and history. The city was built on marshes and its landscape reminds us of the importance of understanding geology and geomorphology (how the underlying geology affects the landscape it carries).
Red (the "sandstones") and white (the limestones) are colours that come to mind when describing Cork. Making up the city’s flag these colours not only represent the two main rock types that form the foundations of the city, but these rocks were also used to build the historical monuments, walls and houses in the city.
With our geoheritage project, primarily funded by Geological Survey Ireland and Cork City Council’s Heritage Office, we’ll show you that geology is everywhere around us and has great cultural and historical importance. Geology is fun and we’ll explain it in simple ways, making the topic accessible to everyone.
We’ve consulted with experts, dived into current geological research and used technological tools from graphic design, animation and photogrammetry to make Cork’s rocks come alive. We’ve also produced visual reconstructions of what Cork looked like in the distant past and 3D models of local rocks and fossils.
Our virtual walking trails will guide you through historical and geological Cork, helping you to imagine what the city looked like a very long time ago.
With Hardcore Cork other successes have come about!
- We’ve hosted free in-person geological heritage tours as part of the annual Heritage Week for three years in a row showing interested participants the city’s landscape, monuments, history and rocks.
- We’ve worked with Cork City Council in producing a digital and physical brochure describing Cork’s geological heritage in text and images.
- Continuing our collaboration with Cork City Council, we also co-created a video describing Cork’s geological history.
- We’ve helped Geological Survey Ireland audit some of the city’s geological sites with the intention of highlighting their scientific and natural significance.
- Overall, we’ve kept creating attention towards Cork’s geology and how it ties in with the city’s society, history and everyday life!
We invite you to enjoy all of it – this website, the additional resources and of course, the city itself.
The Team
Aude Cincotta
Aude has a Bachelor’s and Master’s degree in Earth Sciences from the University of Brussels and a PhD in Palaeontology from the University of Namur in Belgium. She moved from Brussels to Cork in October 2018 to work on the preservation of fossils in amber (fossil tree resin) in the department of Geology at University College Cork.
She then relocated to Dublin in 2019 for a year to undertake a postdoctoral internship at the Irish Research Council and then returned to her research on fossils in Cork.
Aude is now back in her home country where, after pursuing research on Devonian fossils, she took another career path. She now works in a consulting firm helping companies shaping their R&D projects and getting public funding. You can read some of the exciting research she’s done at her Research Gate-profile.
Thomas Heising
Originally from Denmark, Thomas is working in Cork as a motion graphics artist and visual science communicator. He completed his BSc in geology and geoscience at the University of Copenhagen before getting an MA in African Studies which he has since coupled with his creative background.
He too arrived to Cork in 2018 where he initially worked in IT. But inspired by the beautiful landscapes of Cork, he then brought his passion for graphics up again; building into a full-time visual science communication role. He has since worked on projects aimed at communicating climate change, marine biology, sustainability, atmospheric sciences and, of course, geology. His work can be viewed on his website: thomasheising.ie.
Time in Cork is also spent on activism, hiking, geological excursions around the country and personal video projects.
