Meet the Galway craftsman capturing seaside finds in cast concrete
Paddy O’Malley has made an art form out of studying the shoreline. Here, he shares the secrets behind his concrete-cast creations and how he gathers gifts from the sea to keep forever in your home.
Like most people who work with their hands and have a true connection with what they are making, Paddy O’Malley has the utmost respect for his chief investor: Mother Nature. She is both his muse and, in many cases, his material.
His favourite part of his process is searching the beaches for found marine materials such as sea glass, driftwood, shells, pebbles, fish skeletons, seaweed, fossils and sand to incorporate into his work but also studying the way nature presents these treasures.
“At first, I tried too hard to organise the raw beach materials in my concrete, but this humanises it. Now I never put my best feature in the centre,” he says. “I like my concrete to look like a part of the beach was picked up at low tide the way the waves arranged it and dropped in someone’s house.”
Each piece is unique, from monumental slabs to tiles that fit in your hand, all featuring Paddy’s signature imprint of the little details that are most captivating about Connemara, in a striking terrazzo effect.
His first foray into the world of concrete casting came while he was living in the US. “I made my first concrete countertop for my little house there. It turned out pretty good, so a lot of my friends at the time wanted one too. Soon strangers were calling, so I’ve kept it up ever since.”
He spends his time making moulds, mixing various recipes of concrete, but mostly grinding and polishing down the concrete with a wet grinder polisher that is air powered and uses a continuous flow of water to keep the diamond pads cool.
His seaside studio in the village of Aillebrack, with views of the Aran Islands and the Twelve Bens mountain range, is tightly packed with a rich array of natural materials from the land and sea of Connemara. “Shells, gorse and many other natural materials that people walk past is what appeals to me,” he explains. “I use them with cement to create practical pieces of art that people do want.”
After nearly 30 years in the States and the UK, he is now back 12 years in his childhood home. “We live in the middle of the Atlantic, where my mother and father raised me and my nine siblings with the help of a small open boat. The sea was a big part of my dad’s life and I’m very happy for it to have such a special place in mine.”
Paddy is part of a new generation of local makers and tastemakers, including interior designers Rosie Johnson and Sadhbh O’Gorman of Provenance Interior in Clifden, who spotted Paddy’s talents and sell most of his work. Thankful of the help from Rosie and Sadhbh, Paddy can “carefully design a piece of concrete that is both functional and beautiful, and more importantly looks like it belongs in the place it was designed for”, and his work can find its way more easily to people.
“My favourite piece I’ve ever made sits in Provenance Interior,” he says. “It’s a small piece of seashell and sea gravel mixed with a fuchsia wreath embedded, sticking out wherever it wants.”
If you are hoping to enquire at Provenance about his work, Paddy’s advice is to think long and hard about where in your home it would work. His experience has taught him that placement is everything. “When making a table, countertop or tile, you need to pay a lot of attention to where it is going. If you get it wrong, you might as well scrap it and start again.” His advice is to consider the other materials and colours that will surround it. Concrete’s cold, harsh and brutalist connotations can often be a misconception – Paddy maintains that it is, more often than not, “soft, warm and elegant” in interiors.
Interestingly, he adds, even with nearly 30 years working with this material, it is still hard to predict. It is slow and considered but with a hint of surprise.
“Concrete isn’t an exact science; it will never come out exactly as you imagine. There are a lot of happy accidents. Before polishing, it’s like a piece of rough pavement. After many wet and dirty hours of polishing, a piece of art emerges. Mother Nature has already done the real work at that point, the pain in my back goes away and I stand there smiling at the piece.”
Enquire about Paddy O’Malley’s work at Provenance Interior, Clifden.
Photography: Cliodhna Prendergast
This feature originally appeared in the autumn/winter 2023 issue of IMAGE Interiors. Have you thought about becoming a subscriber? Find out more, and sign up here.
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