Re: Re: ‘Dutch Billys’
Ah I think it’s fair to say the Chearnley view is a relatively accurate depiction, gunter. There are considerable changes and imposed detail compared with the former. It is probably unlikely that decorative gables would feature on random maritime buildings serving the adjacent waterfront, being more suited to street architecture as you say. Beautiful use of light as always.
Great material earlier on Middle Abbey Street. Sadly that house at No. 55 probably stood right up until the 1980s, when the current hideously brooding, dark brick office building was erected on the site 🙁
Nonetheless there is a considerable amount of transitional stock remaining on Middle Abbey Street, if much of it characteristically difficult to pinpoint in date. I couldn’t find the pictures that I took of these houses in the pelting rain before Christmas, so had to re-snap them today. This pair of houses – No. 51 left and No. 50 right – appear to date to the early and mid-18th century respectively.
No. 51 retains exposed sash boxes to the windows, possibly original, including at basement level. The sashes are all modern.
The doorcase probably dates to around 1800, as with the railings, suggestive of an early date prompting a remodelling. The door looks as if it may be the original.
The elegant, simple top-and-sides panelled window reveals to the interior make one wonder if the first floor room is entirely panelled up there.
John Rocque depicts this plot on his map as having a house with no return on it. This tallies with what we have now. And, wow, what a rear it has!
Surely a gabled house?! From what can be made out from the air, it unfortunately doesn’t appear to retain an original roof.
The rear of the adjacent house at No. 50 is clearly of slightly later, mid 18th century date. But it does have a return characteristic of a transitional house, and as depicted by Rocque.
The front of the house (right) is more expressly of mid-18th century date, with larger and more generously spaced windows and a pedimented doorcase.
(not my bike, honest)
The interior has been gutted, and continues to be. As I was standing there, a chap went in the front door of what is now ‘Dublin 1 Apartments’, self-catering units run by the Abbey Hotel a couple of doors down. In so doing, he exposed giant two-over-two PVC sash windows lying in the hall, wrapped in plastic and waiting to be installed in the front elevation (given the rear has already been fitted out). A Protected Structure indeed.
