Belfast and Limerick youth launch Living Legends anthology

Young people from Belfast and Limerick gathered in Limerick this past weekend to celebrate the launch of Living Legends, a new anthology celebrating a cross-border youth exchange. The project brought 23 participants together through storytelling, myth and landscapes.

Young people from Belfast and Limerick gathered in Limerick for the launch of the Living Legends anthology

Led by Narrative 4, Living Legends is a cross-border cultural exchange designed to connect and engage young people across communities and traditions on the island of Ireland.

Delivered in partnership with R-City Belfast, Festival in a Van and the Northern Ireland Youth Forum, the project aimed to create connections between young people from Limerick and Belfast while fostering creativity, storytelling and artistic expression.

The participants came from Shankill and Ardoyne in Belfast, as well as Garryowen, Southill and the wider Limerick area.

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Over the spring and summer of 2025, participants travelled and worked together in some of Ireland’s most iconic locations, including Doolin, the Aran Islands, Carlingford and the North Antrim Coast. They engaged in creative workshops with traditional storytellers, musicians, writers, fashion designers and other artists, including Colum McCann, Órla McGovern, Pat Ryan, Rab Fulton, Harry Hennessy, Arthur Greene, Dafe Orugbo, Nigro Impacto, James Riordan, Claire Garvey and Cian Laffey.

The resulting anthology, Living Legends, features original writing, artwork and photography created by the young people throughout the project and includes a foreword by internationally acclaimed author Colum McCann.

In his foreword, McCann reflects on the power of the project, writing, “The project illustrated in extraordinary ways that vision can always defeat division. Throughout the project, the young participants showed remarkable courage, openness and curiosity. Deep connections were formed, and many assumptions about each other were challenged and reshaped. Friendships developed across communities that might never otherwise have met.”

For participants, the experience reshaped their perspectives and facilitated genuine friendships.

“Living Legends has changed how I look at people from Ireland,” said Ella, a participant from Shankill, Belfast.

“It gave me the confidence to meet people, make new friends and work with artists. Improv and the acting classes were my favourite. I had never acted before,” said Travis, a participant from Southill Limerick.

Rachel Gleeson, Executive Director of Narrative 4, said the impact of the project was evident from start to finish.

She said, “The impact of Living Legends is written on the faces of these young people: confidence, joy and real connection. They’ve challenged stereotypes, broken down barriers and all the while learned about the incredibly rich heritage of our island and gained the confidence to tell their own stories.”

Eve McGrath, Youth Worker, R City, said, “Half of them [Belfast participants] didn’t know where Limerick was. They struggled with each other’s accents, but by the third meeting they understood each other’s slang words and had built a real connection.”

Living Legends is supported by the Creative Youth Creative Ireland Programme, part of the Government’s Shared Island Initiative. The Shared Island Initiative aims to harness the full potential of the Good Friday Agreement to enhance cooperation, connection and mutual understanding on the island of Ireland, engaging with all communities and traditions to build consensus around a shared future.

The anthology was officially launched in Limerick on Saturday, 24 January, by Mayor of Limerick John Moran and Jennifer Moroney-Ward, CEO of Limerick City Partnership, with participants from Belfast travelling to attend the celebration and mark the culmination of the cross-border exchange together.