Old pictures of Dublin

Date taken: June 1946
Photographer: Hans Wild

Date taken: February 1948
Photographer: Tony Linck

Date taken: April 1949
Photographer: Larry Burrows

“People celebrating the independence of Ireland on O’Connell bridge before midnight on Easter Sunday.”

Date taken: April 1952
Photographer: Thomas Mcavoy

Date taken: 1953
Photographer: George Silk

Date taken: June 06, 1963
Photographer: John Dominis

“Motorcade of US President John F. Kennedy moving down crowd lined street during a visit to Dublin.”

Fantastic photographs.

That second last one must be Hardwick Crescent, haven’t seen that before.
Where was the five storey with the Bovril sign?

thanks for posting morlan, most shots i haven’t seen either – plenty of new desktop wallpaper material 😉

@gunter wrote:

Where was the five storey with the Bovril sign?

Its just marked as ‘political posters covering the wall of a building’

http://images.google.com/hosted/life/l?q=dublin+source:life&imgurl=8d3247e5df5775e5

Thanks Morlan, fantastic.

@gunter wrote:

Fantastic photographs.

That second last one must be Hardwick Crescent, haven’t seen that before.
Where was the five storey with the Bovril sign?

Greta photos indeed Morlan thanks for posting. The Bovril sign on the 5 storey is intriguing, I would guess it’s somewhere in the Monto?

where;s the last one in the 2nd post.. with the policeman in the street?

@alonso wrote:

where;s the last one in the 2nd post.. with the policeman in the street?

The building directly behind is where Liberty Hall is now. The building in the disance on the right was Brooks Thomas, now the irish Life centre

site of the lockout? the original Liberty Hall? so it’s Eden Quay/Butt Bridge junction? Wow how peaceful it once was….
Didn’t recongnise it. Thanks.

Thank you Morlan.

Baggot Street and St. Stephen’s Green are gems. Thanks again.

Dublin used to be such a pretty City..

@Punchbowl wrote:

Dublin used to be such a pretty City..

yeh but now we have more jobs and less Polio.

@goneill wrote:

The building directly behind is where Liberty Hall is now. The building in the disance on the right was Brooks Thomas, now the irish Life centre

Never realised the Georgians in the middle background that stand on the site of the current /1980s Beresford House office block were identical to the other Beresford Place townhouses opposite the North entrance to the Custom House. Looked to be in perfect nick also, did the ITGWU own them or whoever developed the Irish Life centre:mad:

@Peter Fitz wrote:

Its just marked as ‘political posters covering the wall of a building’

http://images.google.com/hosted/life/l?q=dublin+source:life&imgurl=8d3247e5df5775e5

It definitely says ‘Place’ but the first word could be… Windsor? Werburgh? Miriam? Dunlop? Very difficult to make out.

A detail:

@tommyt wrote:

Never realised the Georgians in the middle background that stand on the site of the current /1980s Beresford House office block were identical to the other Beresford Place townhouses opposite the North entrance to the Custom House. Looked to be in perfect nick also, did the ITGWU own them or whoever developed the Irish Life centre:mad:

Didn’t An Taisce get into trouble for saying the same thing? and then some developer established that they were post 1920s neo-Georgians.

Vague memory coming back.

@ctesiphon wrote:

It definitely says ‘Place’ but the first word could be… Windsor? Werburgh? Miriam? Dunlop? Very difficult to make out.

A detail:

I, for some reason, was given a magnifying glass in work today.. Still no joy. In fact, I think I may of made myself cross-eyed.

@alonso wrote:

site of the lockout? the original Liberty Hall? so it’s Eden Quay/Butt Bridge junction? Wow how peaceful it once was….
Didn’t recongnise it. Thanks.

Not always so peaceful:

This one from Earlsfort Terrace.. From the pillars on the front of that house (site now occupied by the Conrad etc) it looks like that entire street was once lined with a terrace of grand houses similar to the few remianing ones at the Adelaide Rd end…

Alexr college was there before moving out to the burbs in the 60s AFAIK. The dereliction of Earlsfort Terrace takes up a good section of ‘The Destruction of Dublin’- apparently it was held speculatively for 20 years as a cleared site apart from the then derelict terrace on lwr Leeson. I remember that stretch of Lower leeson as a teenager passing it on the 46A c.1984/5. Around nos 10-20 Lwr Leeson were briefly squatted by the infamous ‘keltic klan’ group of punks (who included in their number a young Pauge Behan).

One of the problems with nice old photographs like these is that they tend to spark a comparison between ‘then’ and ‘now’, and, in the comparison, ‘now’ usually doesn’t do very well.

@tommyt wrote:

Alexr college was there before moving out to the burbs in the 60s AFAIK. The dereliction of Earlsfort Terrace takes up a good section of ‘The Destruction of Dublin’- apparently it was held speculatively for 20 years as a cleared site apart from the then derelict terrace on lwr Leeson. I remember that stretch of Lower leeson as a teenager passing it on the 46A c.1984/5. Around nos 10-20 Lwr Leeson were briefly squatted by the infamous ‘keltic klan’ group of punks (who included in their number a young Pauge Behan).

Yeah my early memories of Earlsfort Terrace is the long hoarding along the cleared side.

where was this?

That one’s been doing my head in too. The homepage says ‘A street in the red-light district where many brothels reside’, so that narrows it a bit, but equally, it might all be gone. That’s certainly one impressively regimented terrace.

is this denmark street? with the junction going down to rutland place?

@Paul Clerkin wrote:

where was this?

The houses in the distance look like Foley Street used to.

@ctesiphon wrote:

That one’s been doing my head in too. The homepage says ‘A street in the red-light district where many brothels reside’, so that narrows it a bit, but equally, it might all be gone. That’s certainly one impressively regimented terrace.

could be summerhill – which I’ve only seen photos of the back off prior to demolition

certainly the right area for the description newgrange
personally the juvenile in me always like the fact that beaver street and beaver close was in the monto

A later picture of the same spot, from Terry Fagan’s ‘Monto – Madams, Murder and Black Coddle’

@newgrange wrote:

A later picture of the same spot, from Terry Fagan’s ‘Monto – Madams, Murder and Black Coddle’

A great book-highly recommended- I got my copy in the barbers under the railway arch on Amiens st of all places.

For the record I do have a photo of myself and a group of friends tittering and pointing at the street sign for beaver street from a while back:o. it was still there up until 3/4 years ago on a pebble dashed wall before those new apartments were built on site

This is described as Foley Street – would this be the back of that terrace?

“Mrs Fagan looks out her window she was the tenent to leave Foley Street in the 1980s”
http://www.dublinfolklore.ie/

Yes. It’s where the park is now.
There’s another picture from more or less the same spot in the North Inner City Folklore Project’s 1999 calendar.

Another shot from the same calendar.
Foley Street.

@Paul Clerkin wrote:

is this denmark street? with the junction going down to rutland place?

I don’t think its Rutland Place, Paul – it’s much narrower than this shot… It is North Central Dublin though, and the year is 1948 – the election posters for Clann na Poblachta and Fine Gael give candidates names… Maybe Monto? 😎

@hutton wrote:

I don’t think its Rutland Place, Paul – it’s much narrower than this shot… It is North Central Dublin though, and the year is 1948 – the election posters for Clann na Poblachta and Fine Gael give candidates names… Maybe Monto? 😎

Could it be the junction of Denmark/Hill st?. If it is there is a single storey corner shop adjoining that gable on site now. I am a bit thrown by the adjoining doorways though… might cycle that way tonight out of curiosity

Nope, building in photo has extra storey

it’s going to drive me mental – its definitely ”

That doorway arrangement is pretty distinctive too

Yeah nothing in the Gardiner or Fitzwillian estate is 5 storeys. It’s more like a late-period Wide Streets Comms. building, like the group on Dame St between Crow Street and Temple Lane … no ‘places’ around there though .. Arrgh!

@Devin wrote:

Yeah nothing in the Gardiner or Fitzwillian estate is 5 storeys. It’s more like a late-period Wide Streets Comms. building, like the group on Dame St between Crow Street and Temple Lane … no ‘places’ around there though .. Arrgh!

But it can’t be over there anyway – it’ s got to be within the north central constituency…

Yeah Hutton, that’s where I’m looking – scanning the map for possible locations

Think I’ve got it!! There were a pair of such 5-storey houses beside the Four Courts, and with ads on the gable. And when you look on the old maps, right enough there’s a ‘place’ there. And it’s within the north inner city hutton. Got to be it, hasn’t it?

(1847 map)

And it’s got adverts on the gable in your second picture.
Of course the traffic went the other way in those days, which means the gable would have been seen.
Good work Moneypenny, Morgan place it is.

Nice work….

@Paul Clerkin wrote:

Nice work….

Quick scooch over the 1911 census reveals at least 3 hotels on this stretch of Kings Inns quay possibly explaining the doorway configuration? The two houses on listed Morgan place contained 11 seperate houeholds. Is this the present day Aras Ui Dhailigh site or the extension buildings of the Four Courts complex?

This one shows a picture of the building (I think it was a gospel hall) which stood on the site of the present Davenport Hotel, which retains its front façade. It’s surprising difficult to find pictures of it.

oops, dunno what I did wrong. Here’s URL anyway
http://images.google.com/hosted/life/f?q=dublin+source:life&imgurl=8e8b9a87cb9370c3

brilliant thread ,most enjoyable, does anybody have pictures of

30 LOWER ORMOND QUAY & 23 & 24 GREAT STRAND ST.

Great photographs!……It looked a great old city despite the poverty.

Glad you all enoyed the pics.

@Devin wrote:

Think I’ve got it!!

I don´t know how you did it but great work!

You win a:

@newgrange wrote:

Morgan place it is.

Gah! Missed my chance for glory.

I was looking this up in work yesterday, in the OSI Dublin Street Guide (7th Ed.). I figured it was six letters, thought the first was probably M, and then searched the index for Mangan Place. There’s none, but a listing for Morgan Place did catch my eye. It has a grid reference but didn’t appear to be on the map, which is odd, given that such streets usually have a number of they’re too small to be titled. It’s not like the OSI to make such a mistake, but I thought nothing more of it. And then this!

Looking again, the street is mentioned, but the name is printed on a red background so is barely visible.

Anyway, nice work, all.

so it’s now the entrance to the 4 courts and car park. Wonder does it still have a street sign? Live maps would suggest not

@alonso wrote:

so it’s now the entrance to the 4 courts and car park. Wonder does it still have a street sign? Live maps would suggest not

Just cycled past at lunchtime- the whole footprint of the terrace to the quays is indeed obliterated by Aras Ui Dhailigh. Another one of the city’s charming and subtle late twentieth century reimaginings of working with brick.

@tommyt wrote:

Just cycled past at lunchtime- the whole footprint of the terrace to the quays is indeed obliterated by Aras Ui Dhailigh. Another one of the city’s charming and subtle late twentieth century reimaginings of working with brick.

Lol 😀

Well spotted, Devin.

@Morlan wrote:

Glad you all enoyed the pics.

I don´t know how you did it but great work!

You win a:

Thanks Morlan. Can’t make out what it is but it looks apetising 🙂

The ground floor arcading helped identify it.

Ctesiphon, Miriam Place wasn’t too far off!

Fair play to hutton too for narrowing down the location by electoral jurisdiction and getting the year (1948)!

Nother pic here of the buildings. Sorry about the quality. It’s a photograph of a picture hanging in the reception of the Central Hotel, Exchequer Street:

]

http://tbn0.google.com/hosted/images/c?q=8d3247e5df5775e5_large

And ta Morlan for all the pics. The slightly different views of old photos we’re familiar with are great.

…

this is a sketch of the wall of signs

Those old pics of the quays shows that the buildings that graced the riverfront were quite substantial, particularly in the image of the buildings that have 4 – 5 storeys beside the Four Courts. Shows how much the quays had deteriorated since old times!

Some great stuff here – thanks for the effort Morlan 😉

What’s always interesting about photographs from the 1940s and 1950s is seeing a city on the cusp of change; the last gasp of the old regime before the new world of modernity is ushered in. The earlier alterations are often already apparent – the city awkwardly trying to modernise itself through a veneer of neon signage, new shopfronts and motorised traffic, but all layered over the existing substructure of a decaying classical buildng stock which seemed omnipresent – just ‘there’ in the background, but rarely acknowledged and used merely as a support structure for better things.

What I always find a constant in these pictures too – whether self-generated or not is hard to define – is the sense of a complete lack of a ownership amongst the public over their city. They neither knew what they had, why they had it, or saw any reason to get involved in its improvement, promotion or protection. All as if it was beyond their control, as if cities were far too unweildy machines to even attempt to tame, if indeed even worthy of it in the first place. One thing is certain though – poverty in some shape or form lurks beneath every last photograph. It’s a shame that when money did arrive ten, twenty years later, it was so sorely misdirected.

This picture of the Four Courts is most interesting. The replacement granite to the front of the east wing graphically displays the extent to which the building was blasted during the Civil War. I’d never seen it so clearly before.

Indeed the extent to which many of our major public buidings looked like a collection of patchwork quilts for much of the 20th century is something that is probably under-acknowledged.

This scene of the Grafton Street end of Nassau Street is a gem. Jammet’s was considered one of Dublin’s better restaurants in the mid 20th century.

Such a shame this projecting buildng has now lost its significance through crude alterations and its positioning in the midst of a tawdry jumble of high street outlets. Interesting also to note the pavement width of the reticent 1940s is still in place for the heaving crowds of today…

All of the shops appear to have protective grilles over their windows. Must have been early morning, or perhaps a Sunday.

graham is that nassau st pic corresponding to the Sound Cellar and Subway stretch? Is Jammets now the Porterhouse, formerly Judge Roy Beans, with the 1st floor window now the Library bar of Lillies – must remember to look upwards next time i’m there

Yep alonso. What a change eh?!

For some reason that area is probably the most chaotic part of the entire city centre. Nobody has a clue what anything looks like. You’re bombarded with hoards of pedestrians, queues into Subway, brash shopfronts, an obstacle course of utility boxes and taxi rank-cum-loading bay, and a preposterously narrow footpath to top it all off. It’s every man for himself – just getting out of it is an achievement, never mind getting a glimpse of its building stock!

yeh and the arcaded block on the Dawson st corner just adds to it. Still n all, there’s a true Dublin institution in amongst the random mess – the Sound Cellar, the greatest little record shop in the city – down that narrow corridor to the right of Subway – always has a few tickets for the sold out shows if you were known to the fine character and proprietor Tommy Tighe. There’s much commentary here, especially in recent times, about old fashioned retail in the city, and despite the niche nature of this particular shop, i think it represents something that is encreasinly being lost. Oddities like prices always being rounded up to the pound/euro, none of this 12.99 nonsense, never getting a receipt coz you were never questioned when bringing a scratched cd or Lp back and way before the tax, you always got a brown paper bag rather than plastic . A great place and I hope it’s surviving well in this download age. Although we all abhor street clutter, Nassau street without the Sound Cellar tickets and gigs listings board wouldn’t be the same

(some of ye are nostalgic for fine terraces, some for street lighting, others for statues, great buildings, simple forms and epic architecture. I’m nostalgic for the place I bought my first punk rock records and tickets for Slayer in the SFX – different strokes eh?)

Very interesting little analysis, never knew this little enclave was also part of the exchq/wicklow area of what I explain to visitors as the ‘victorian neo-hip’ core of the city. Alonso is dead right about the sound cellar being a socio-historical gem Apart from the proprietor beign a dyed in the wool Shamrock Rovers ne’er do well ( for posters on here only familiar with the SKY TV version of this sporting code, it’s quite distinct from the inter- parish brawling more popular on this island. you may be surprised itp know in real life actual soccer teams do play against one another in this city-not just on the telly).
As for the SFX, we should have a general thread for the city’s lost live music venues/ the list would be endless… I will start it myself soon but I could only start it from c.1985…

Interesting how John Morton Jeweller (last shop on the right – the one with the three ladies looking in the window – how times change eh) managed to survive intact so long having only closed in 2005 – the shopfront virtually the same as pictured here

enjoyed seeing those vintage photos too. Just looking at that image of Nassau St really brought it home that you often miss out on the fantastic architecture out there above the ground floor of buildings. As the other poster said, you are so busy trying to watch your footing, not being knocked down by cyclists etc that you miss out on some gems.

Stumbled across a site recently that has a lot of photos of Dublin from late 1980’s/early 90s. While not of the same vintage as the ones above, it brought back some memories of how the Dublin I grew up in looked like. The pics are dominated by buses which is the purpose of the website gallery so a lot of the architecture/streetscapes are obscured but some of you may enjoy this more recent trip down memory lane. If this has been submitted elsewhere, my apologies. PS hope the owner of this website doesn’t mind my opening it up to an additional audience. link below.

http://www.wheelingintheyears.com/index.html

@tomk wrote:

not being knocked down by cyclists etc

:confused:

On this stretch of Nassau Street? Really? On the footpath or on the road?

Views of Ireland, New York 1884

Views of Ireland,New York 1884

Did the Liffey drain away in 1884? It’s been sucked out of the O’Connell Street illustration 😀

Old Carlisle Bridge was humpbacked so it just looks like it

Date taken: April 1952
Photographer: Thomas Mcavoy[/B]

Does anybody know where this photo is taken?? The houses look rather like the council houses in Marino and Inchicore…. but only one fireplace per house? Is that not rather strange?? Considering they appear to be the larger 3 bedroom houses, one would expect to find 8 chimney pots in each of those stacks, not 2….

That’s a great image of Wood Quay – always wondered what it looked like before it got swept away, and now I know it was a lot more interesting than what’s there now!

Tara Street and Butt Bridge, the second and third are taken from where Apollo house is now I think, anymore would be great

It’s interesting to note the original Butt Bridge had pedestrian walkways approaching the mechanised section with balustrading and lamp standards of a similar design to the contemporaneously reconstructed O’Connell Bridge. The lamps and their chamfered stone plinths are identical, with the exception of them seemingly being dual-armed, of which there are strangely no other examples in the city. A shame, indeed quite odd, they weren’t reused in the 1930s reconstruction.

Curious little lamps atop the piers of the Loop Line Bridge too.

1 of 4 picks of the wood quay site at rebuild 1977
http://www.flickr.com/photos/catb/sets/72157600197787349/

forgive me if i have this arse over tit, but are those people standing on Fishamble street? Is that Handels Arch to the left? If so, bloody hell!!! What was on that site immediately before it was cleared?

Take a look at the other photo with Christchurch in the background, provided in the link, also look at RHK – bloody hell!

@alonso wrote:

forgive me if i have this arse over tit, but are those people standing on Fishamble street? Is that Handels Arch to the left? If so, bloody hell!!! What was on that site immediately before it was cleared?

Yes, Fishamble St. The site as you see it before it was cleared was Dublin Corporation Waterworks Department yard. The people in the photo are standing in front of the Turncocks office, which is visible in the photo. Across the street (behind the people in the photo) were the Waterworks offices.

how was there so much overgrowth? Is that due to the length of time the site was exposed after clearance and then excavation? it looks like a site that had been vacant for decades. Anyone got any pics of the site with the yard in situ?

@Devin wrote:

Thanks Morlan. Can’t make out what it is but it looks apetising 🙂

The ground floor arcading helped identify it.

Ctesiphon, Miriam Place wasn’t too far off!

Fair play to hutton too for narrowing down the location by electoral jurisdiction and getting the year (1948)!

Nother pic here of the buildings. Sorry about the quality. It’s a photograph of a picture hanging in the reception of the Central Hotel, Exchequer Street:

]

http://tbn0.google.com/hosted/images/c?q=8d3247e5df5775e5_large

And ta Morlan for all the pics. The slightly different views of old photos we’re familiar with are great.

Fantastic photo, this is fabulous I was told by a colleague in the Four Courts recently that there was a hotel where Aras Ui Dalaigh stands now.

Aras Ui Dalaigh is a desperate building .

Those Wood Quay shots are great

@daithidaithi wrote:

Tara Street and Butt Bridge, the second and third are taken from where Apollo house is now I think, anymore would be great

McFerran must have joined Heitons last pic

Wow, amazing pics, fascinating to see all those old views and try to recognize stuff…

http://www.flickr.com/photos/gentlemanofletters/

“Kevin was a proud father and loving husband who’s family meant everything to him, but this profile is here firstly to showcase and remember his work and secondly because he himself would have been a Flickr member, because of his love of photography and gadgetry.

“We (Kevin’s family) do sometimes come across his work that we had not known about, but as time goes on and Dublin changes it happens less and less.
Kevin loved his city passionately and I believe it would break his heart to see it now changed beyond recognition and not for the better either.”

Signwriting by Kevin Freeney.
Late 1950’s or early 1960’s. Dawson Street.

Taken in the 1970’s at Jervis Street & Parnell Street junction where Penny’s is now.
Opposite this pub (where the cinema is now) was the factory where they made Silvermints, Williams & Woods (there was always a smell of Peppermint in the air of Parnell St from it), a fine big granite building it was and I believe it was the intended destination of the rebels in 1916 when they escaped the burning GPO and tried to make their way up Moore Street.

1981 Stephens Green showing what was there before the Shopping Centre.
R.O. Jones (the facade on the right hand side of this picture) is the Decorating Company that Kevin served his apprenticeship to painting and decorating with.

The corner of Grantham Street and Camden Street

Signwriting by Kevin Freeney

Signwriting by Kevin Freeney. This shop was at the corner of Liffey Street and Abbey Street.

Signwriting by Kevin Freeney. Nassau Street pre 1968

Junction of Russell Street & North Circular Road

Plenty more over at http://www.flickr.com/photos/gentlemanofletters/

Wow, what a gorgeous collection of photos! And although I’m only an adoptive Dubliner, it’s great fun trying to recognize the spots… Thank you!

Brilliant stuff. I’m fairly certain a family member worked in that building at Abbey St/Liffey st. It was condemned in the 1960’s sometime and the Corpo used to visit regularly to assess how dangerous it was and how long it could be inhabited and in use until it fell down. It still stands to this day. (if i’ve got the right building) http://maps.live.com/default.aspx?v=2&FORM=LMLTCC&cp=swr5qmggb6hx&style=o&lvl=2&tilt=-90&dir=0&alt=-1000&phx=0&phy=0&phscl=1&scene=29508143&encType=1

Fantastic photographs!

‘The Commodore’ on Parnell Street will bring back memories to the Bolton St. architectural community of a certain era!

Great photos all round. The big thing that strikes me from all these is how badly we now do corners. Dublin certainly is a changed city.

@gunter wrote:

Fantastic photographs!

‘The Commodore’ on Parnell Street will bring back memories to the Bolton St. architectural community of a certain era!

Looked a damn fine pub.
Awesome shots indeed.

@Punchbowl wrote:

Dublin used to be such a pretty City..

Indeed, I agree. Looking at the early photos (circa 1930s, 40’s) compared to the later ones (circa 1970′, 80’s), the place looked so uniform and intact overall. Nothing jarring.

Little did the folk know what the city was to suffer with the brutal treatment in the coming years. The scars are everywhere now, even if they are patched up a bit. And unlike other European cities, the Luftwaffe or the RAF are not to blame for the damage.

Great early photos of a Dublin lost forever.

Someone’s due to mention the grinding poverty of the city anytime now.

@gunter wrote:

Fantastic photographs!

‘The Commodore’ on Parnell Street will bring back memories to the Bolton St. architectural community of a certain era!

I’m of a certain era…….just about.
Commodore was sold & the former owner I believe bought Ashtons beside Richview…..Treachery!

The Commodore was CPO’d, eventually, by the corpo who intended to build the “Inner Tangent” from the Five Lamps through Summerhill and through the top end of Capel Street. For decades Parnell Street west was largely derelict as the corpo refused permission to owners to do anything , (while also not actually going though with the CPOs). They were just about to break though Capel Street when Ciaran Cuffe and Co arrived on the City Council (c1991?) and put an overdue stop to the whole thing. That’s why Parnell Street is about double its original width. The Commodore was sited at the central reservation. I guess that is also why the bit of the Royal Dublin Hotel has a facade at a funny angle where it sticks out onto Parnell. I was there today – what a shambles!

How interesting that the building line went out that far. The famous former staggered outline of Jervis Street is also visible with the Commodore and its neighbour. It’s notable how few run-of-the-mill Victorian buildings such as these are now left in the city core with plain walls of glossy red brick and simple two-over-two windows. And they’re still vanishing (Chamber Street pub anyone?). Glad the Abbey Street/Liffey Street corner survived (spot on alonso) – one of the handsomest shopfronts in the city.

It’s eerie how you can ‘sense’ the location of buildings simply by their style and form. The Nassau Street terrace just looks like Nassau Street, presumably on account of its curious similarity with the surviving terrace at the corner with Grafton Street, which also features some grand shopfronts and an odd projection in the building line. I can’t quite place the photo though – the site of the recently-built Trinity Point office building by Shay Cleary? It seems to be that corner with the rendered building opposite still intact.

Such skill Kevin Freeney had – a lost art. Fabulous use of text and fonts. Of course I’d be apoplectic over untainted upper facades being embellished in such a fashion, but we’ll gloss over that in the interests of nostalgia.

Anyone know what the last (stone) statue is and where it is know? Also where are the other two bronze statues behind Queen Victoria gone? There were four originally I think, and i know one is in the Millennium wing of Leinster House.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/catb/494843993/in/set-72157600197787349/

@GrahamH wrote:

I can’t quite place the photo though – the site of the recently-built Trinity Point office building by Shay Cleary? It seems to be that corner with the rendered building opposite still intact.

There are few enough candidates on that stretch- it’s not the Kevin & Howlin corner, it’s not the Alliance Francaise… Your guess seems plausible. (Unless there was something on the site of the Setanta that I don’t know about?)

Also, would the street numbers (9 – 11) have changed since then? Quite possibly not.

EDIT: It’s hardly Knobs & Knockers, is it? I don’t think that has a breakfront end-of-terrace house.
EDIT 2: Is the Shay Cleary building not on South Leinster Street? Now I’m confused.

What was on the site of Setanta House?

It’s either knobs and knockers or the author is wrong and it’s actually on sth Leinster ,where the new building w/ the garden table bolt- ons on the corner w Leinster lane.

Yep that’s what I suspected – the street name is wrong.

And it is: Office To Let at Trinity Point, 10-11 South Leinster Street, Dublin 2 🙂

What a loss of such a magnificent French-style oriel window. Very unusual in Dublin.

@Morlan wrote:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/gentlemanofletters/

Taken in the 1970’s at Jervis Street & Parnell Street junction where Penny’s is now.
Opposite this pub (where the cinema is now) was the factory where they made Silvermints, Williams & Woods (there was always a smell of Peppermint in the air of Parnell St from it), a fine big granite building it was and I believe it was the intended destination of the rebels in 1916 when they escaped the burning GPO and tried to make their way up Moore Street.

Here’s a pic below of that granite building from F. O’Dwyer’s book Lost Dublin, with the Commodore on the right, and a comparison of the same view today. Ahh, the townscape charms of the Parnell Centre.

A little known building of Dublin, eh? Apparently it was originally a hospital. Maybe some Commodore patrons ‘of a certain era’ remember it?

What looks like a Dublin Corporation Dangerous Buildings picture, as reprinted in McCullough’s An Urban History.

This is the Williams & Woods warehouse on Kings Inns Street behind that site

http://ireland.archiseek.com/buildings_ireland/dublin/northcity/bolton_street/kingsinns_street/williams_woods_lge.html

Thank God for progress, the Parnell Centre has been such an addition to the city. Good riddance to that eyesore 🙁

I’m just looking at the 1847 map, below, when it was still a hospital. Lost Dublin says:

“In 1925, on the removal of the hospital to Wyckham, Dundrum, the building became the offices of Messrs Williams and Woods who erected factory buildings in the former gardens at the rear. It was sold for redevelopment and demolished in 1978.”

Mad to think there was a gardens there, given that it’s so grim and faceless in that rear lane now. So that warehouse at the corner of Kings Inns Street and Loftus Lane is the only remnant associated with the building, at least when it was a factory.

Sorry for the diversion but check this out
Dublin OConnell Bridge general traffic c.1985

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQOlJItjeZQ

absolute chaos:eek: How come I don’t remember it like it was, it looks like downton Kinshasa or something.

@tommyt wrote:

Sorry for the diversion but check this out
Dublin OConnell Bridge general traffic c.1985

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQOlJItjeZQ

absolute chaos:eek: How come I don’t remember it like it was, it looks like downton Kinshasa or something.

Memories…God I remember the orange buses and even the adverts for Granby Sausages with the 2 pigs…just about:))

C

@tommyt wrote:

How come I don’t remember it like it was, it looks like downton Kinshasa or something.

lot more cyclists too…..
just looks like a traffic free for all

@djasmith wrote:

Date taken: April 1952
Photographer: Thomas Mcavoy[/B]

Does anybody know where this photo is taken?? The houses look rather like the council houses in Marino and Inchicore…. but only one fireplace per house? Is that not rather strange?? Considering they appear to be the larger 3 bedroom houses, one would expect to find 8 chimney pots in each of those stacks, not 2….

Hey, that’s Linenhall Parade, it’s just off King Street North near the junction with Church Street. It’s a very nice little pocket of that part of the city, those trees in the background are in the grounds of Kings’ Inns. On an architectural note, the uniform render has been replaced by some dodgy individual cladding interventions, the original steel windows have lost out to our old pal PVC and if I remember correctly that lovely streetlamp with the shamrock detail has also been replaced by something far more banal.

And with regard to the fireplaces, there is one for each house. The fireplaces are placed back to back with one chimney shared between two houses. That particular terrace only contains 6 houses, hence 3 chimneys, but the majority of the other terraces in that area contain 8 houses. I think one fireplace per house is the norm for council houses of that era, I know that similar houses in Cabra, Crumlin and Kimmage have only one fireplace per house.

Ah great stuff foremanjoe – thanks. And hey presto, we have our terrace 🙂

I’ll pop back over in a day or two to re-take the photo. Any of the now-fifty-somethings in the picture willing to be re-photographed are more than welcome to attend!

@foremanjoe wrote:

Hey, that’s Linenhall Parade, it’s just off King Street North near the junction with Church Street. It’s a very nice little pocket of that part of the city, those trees in the background are in the grounds of Kings’ Inns. On an architectural note, the uniform render has been replaced by some dodgy individual cladding interventions, the original steel windows have lost out to our old pal PVC and if I remember correctly that lovely streetlamp with the shamrock detail has also been replaced by something far more banal.

And with regard to the fireplaces, there is one for each house. The fireplaces are placed back to back with one chimney shared between two houses. That particular terrace only contains 6 houses, hence 3 chimneys, but the majority of the other terraces in that area contain 8 houses. I think one fireplace per house is the norm for council houses of that era, I know that similar houses in Cabra, Crumlin and Kimmage have only one fireplace per house.

the smallest of the council houses (the mid 1930’s batch) which line the streets of crumlin and kimmage all have either 2 or 3 fireplaces per house – 1 upstairs, and 1/2 downstairs. What time would these houses have been built? Im guessing late 1920’s???

@foremanjoe wrote:

Hey, that’s Linenhall Parade, it’s just off King Street North near the junction with Church Street. It’s a very nice little pocket of that part of the city, those trees in the background are in the grounds of Kings’ Inns. On an architectural note, the uniform render has been replaced by some dodgy individual cladding interventions, the original steel windows have lost out to our old pal PVC and if I remember correctly that lovely streetlamp with the shamrock detail has also been replaced by something far more banal.

And with regard to the fireplaces, there is one for each house. The fireplaces are placed back to back with one chimney shared between two houses. That particular terrace only contains 6 houses, hence 3 chimneys, but the majority of the other terraces in that area contain 8 houses. I think one fireplace per house is the norm for council houses of that era, I know that similar houses in Cabra, Crumlin and Kimmage have only one fireplace per house.

A great little terrace/cul de sac of houses. When I lived in Phibsboro I always coveted the corner house furthest in the background of that picture. It has been really well extended and has a great shed in the garden and a generous driveway. The suburban dream 2 mins from the city centre.

@tommyt wrote:

has a great shed in the garden and a generous driveway.

and I believe the owners are away on holiday at the moment.

should have recognised those, i used to live just over the wall

@thebig C wrote:

Memories…God I remember the orange buses and even the adverts for Granby Sausages with the 2 pigs…just about:))

C

And don’t forget the Picnic tinned Salmon

Always wondered how CIE chose that orange colour

Apologies for the vagueness of this response but I remember a lecturer anecdotally telling us how the colour Orange was chosen for the trains and buses of CIE. From what I remember it was an international architect or designer that made the decision, and green had been the preferred choice but this guy put his foot down and was insistent that orange should be the colour. I can’t remember what the reasoning behind this was but I think the general concensus at the time was that green was appropriate but this guy was obviously a top-notch purveyor of new clothes for Emperors.

Sorry again about being so vague, hopefully someone can fill in the blanks in my blanks.

Hang on, might I be thinking of Patrick or Michael Scott?

Their profiles on this website state that they were heavily involved with CIE and had a hand in creating their corporate identity and colour schemes?

http://www.irish-architecture.com/architects_ireland/scottp.html

http://www.irish-architecture.com/architects_ireland/michael_scott/cie.html

@Devin wrote:

Here’s a pic below of that granite building from F. O’Dwyer’s book Lost Dublin

The Parnell Centre is absolutely brutal as a building. And to think that this fine building is what it replaced… 🙁 God it was handsome. Something that fine would be a great anchor to a street with nothing of architectural worth on it apart from the Rotunda way down the other end.

Absolutely, such a grievous loss. What a sense of presence it could have had as an hotel, gallery or even a Dublin Museum, with intimate spaces to the front and large exhibitions in the warehousing to the rear 🙁

Returning to an earlier vestiage of old Dublin, what once was this…

…is now this 🙂

(Just a sliver of artistic licence taken with the LIFE tag *cough*).

Took a bit of time management to get the sun just right; it’s still about half an hour too late, but it’ll do.

And in colour.

So much has changed by way of decoration, but also very little in terms of structural alteration. By and large we are presented with the same terraces. The two most notable developments are the application of paint over the once spare, but uniform, pebbledash finish, and of course the tragic loss of the fabulous array of elegant steel windows.

These were of a particularly picturesque design here, which was relatively rare in Dublin.

Somewhat surprisingly, enviably, the housing scheme is nestled in a little nook beneath the glowering Kings Inns complex on Constitution Hill.

What a delight.

Some houses have been altered beyond recognition of course…

By contrast, the house next door is the only one left in the whole development with its original windows. These are of the plainer of the two designs used in the scheme, but are refined nonetheless. Lovely original slating too.

Sadly, the fabulous swan neck lamppost in the original picture (that model always made for the most spectacular silhouette in black and white photographs) no longer survives, but one does cling on for dear life in an expectedly altered state at the entrance to the ‘parade’ at the junction with North King Street.

Clearly it hasn’t been painted since the 1920s either.

This housing scheme is not, as is to be expected, a Corporation housing development per se, but rather one built by a so-called ‘public utility society’, a commonplace form of housing enterprise in the early years of the 20th century. Ruth McManus explains their operation very well, with the societies effectively operating as property development agencies through the construction of small and medium-scale housing schemes which catered for the ‘lower end’ of the housing market. In theory they were to have philanthropic aims, and by and large they did simply by definition of the modest type of dwellings that they built, usually adjacent to Corporation housing and on land provided by the Corporation with accompanying reduced rates. But like the Dublin Artisans Dwellings Company, at the end of the day these societies provided housing for those who were not in most need of being re-housed, with the desperately poor still living in tenement conditions and awaiting the direct intervention of publically-subsidised mass housing in the city centre and new outlying suburbs.

However, the societies – as with the Linenhall Public Utility Society which built the 63 houses pictured above – helped to significantly reduce the housing shortage of the 1920s and 1930s, and thus were viewed favourably by local authorities and ultimately by legislation in accommodating their endeavours.

The rendered plaque to the Linenhall Society still remains, well presented, on the central end house in the scheme.

The building jutting into the right of the original picture is a curious semi-industrial building of c. 1910 date, built at a remove from the earlier houses on the street in what was probably wasteland at the time.

Jesus Graham, spot on with the comparison photo.

I banged them together in a GIF (4MB), so the transition will lag at first – will loop fine after that. Should really be done in flash but I can’t embed here.

And then they were gone..

Facinating stuff. God knows how you managed to match those two photos so perfectly. I’ve always found it an impossible task with the lens distortion.

@foremanjoe wrote:

Hang on, might I be thinking of Patrick or Michael Scott?

Their profiles on this website state that they were heavily involved with CIE and had a hand in creating their corporate identity and colour schemes?

http://www.irish-architecture.com/architects_ireland/scottp.html

http://www.irish-architecture.com/architects_ireland/michael_scott/cie.html

Patrick Scott was involved with the logo design ok.
However their involvement with CIE was long over when the buses changed from the two tone dark blue scheme to that orange shade.

Although I can’t find a verifiable source, I think Pat Scott designed the black-and-tan CIE train livery of the early 1960s. Nothing to do with the buses, though.

For more on the history of CIE train liveries (including pics but without mention of who designed what), see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coaching_Stock_of_Ireland

@Morlan wrote:

http://img189.imageshack.us/img189/9203/animatedgif.gif

Actually, I probably shouldn’t have put a 4meg file in the thread! So Paul if you want to make it a link, that’d be great – I can’t edit it.

Ah great stuff Morlan! Exactly what was required. I did the same myself in Picture Viewer with a simple dissolve transition, but this is obviously more permanent :). Must learn how to do these things… Many thanks.

The shot was matched on location simply with a printout of the photograph, and maneouvering about on the street like a faintly disturbed individual with an obsession with stepping on paving stone lines, until the required position was reached. You manage perspective using elements in the photograph as base points, such as the overlapping of the terraces in the distance, and work from that – i.e. matching wall lines on the vertical plane and roof levels on the horizontal.

Lens distortion is a problem alright, but luckily a relatively basic lens was used the first time round too (though I did have to stitch that vast sky in rather crudely from a second shot). Tilt the new photo to the desired angle (as much as it pained me to make it off-level) and voila! The same manhole covers on the road and even the same pattern of tarmac helped considerably 🙂

Amazing stuff GrahmH. Heartbreaking to look at the change. It’s shocking how the integrity of a place can be butchered with only a few changes.

I wonder if you could be persuaded to try your hand at more LIFE recreation photos. There great.

Morlan: that animated gif is real spooky. Has a post Neutron bomb kinda feel.

In a sense, it sums up the problems of suburban and residential Dublin. Everybody is striving to be different, to put their ham-fisted individualistic stamp on their property when the real beauty lies in consistency and the whole: in unremarkable but similar fencing, in the same paint colour, in the flourish of a lamp post and the general feel of unity that was intended in design but has been lost with the passage of time.

Precisely.

A great photo exhibition in the National Photographic Archive in Meetinghouse Square at the moment. Well worth a look for some faded Dublin images. Includes one of Fitzwilliam Street being demolished fro the ESB offices.

Agree with StephenC. Catch it before it closes in October.

If ever you go to Dublin town, is an exhibition of evocative photographs by Elinor Wiltshire chronicling Dubliners as they worked, played, shopped and prayed during the 1950s and 1960s. The exhibition title If ever you go to Dublin town takes its name from a poem of the same name by Patrick Kavanagh, who, along with other literary figures, including Flann O’Brien, was a friend and neighbour of Elinor Wiltshire.

In total the Wiltshire Photographic Collection numbers some 1,000 negatives and 300 prints. It was acquired by the National Library of Ireland in 1994 and images from the collection were first exhibited by the Archive in 1999.

These pictures are terrific! As a former resident of Dublin many, many years ago I found the 1950s-era photos particularly interesting.

Does anyone have any pictures of the neon Bovril sign that used to light up the Dublin skyline back in the early 1950s? Maybe ‘lighting up’ is a bit of an exaggeration, but it was visible at least from the Liffey end of O’Connell St looking towards Grafton.

Dublin was a great neon capital, back then. Whether one liked neon or not it pretty much defined the city in the 50s. The Carlton & Metropole cinemas in particular were eye-catchers.

Hope there are lots more pictures out there.

Thanks

Bovril? Or Don and Nelly flipping neon sausages into a frying pan for Donnelly’s? …mmm… Tasty even now, after all the years!

I don’t remember the Donnelly’s neon sign. That’s one I would have remembered. Where was that located? (We were brought up on Castlebar Bacon brand of sausages which my father bought in bulk from their distribution center on Findlater Place, off Marlborough St. A viler place you never saw!)

@litirte wrote:

I don’t remember the Donnelly’s neon sign. That’s one I would have remembered. Where was that located?

D’Olier Street just as you entered the street from O’Connell Bridge, though it was visible for quite a distance. A lady tossed a sausage from a pan, it went across the building (the sausage not the pan 🙂 and became impaled on a fork held by a man.

Found this c1960 pic of the Donnelly’s Sausages neon sign here: http://www.thegrovesocialclub.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=672&PN=1&TPN=5
Nelly, the girl with the frying pan, is on the left. Don, the boy on the right, had a fork in his hand to catch the sausages Nelly flipped his way.

Thanks, guys. Times Square it’s not but our expectations were much lower back then!

Brilliant! How is it that they both had names?

Thank god it was removed before it developed a pesky cultural significance.

I’d love to see the Christmas lights on McBirney’s of Aston Quay in the ’50s. People used to travel miles to see that one.

The store windows were indeed a sight to see at Christmas. Pims department store was another Christmas attraction.

I do not recall seeing the Donnelly’s sign. Either it was installed after I had left or else the sight of a neon sausage flying through the air was so Freudian and disturbing that I ruthlessly suppressed the memory. Probably the latter.

Perhaps some help. I am doing a history Podcast on the area of Dublin 8 and the Guinness company. I am trying to track down some imagery of the slums and tenaments of Dubin during the 1900s. It is important that I can get right to use the images as they will be displayed on web for people to download and listen to the stories and watch the images. any help that can be given in this matter is truly appreciated.

Thanks

Sam

Why not try the National Photographic Archive on Meetinghouse Square.

@GrahamH wrote:

Brilliant! How is it that they both had names?

Thank god it was removed before it developed a pesky cultural significance.

Donnelly Sausages… Don-Nelly, geddit?

It’s been removed? Damn!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VaA0LWRaNqY

Part 1 of Éamonn MacThomáis’s Dublin (get parts 2-8 in the related videos). Only 30 years ago but a completely different city. Seemingly every half a minute in these videos you want to cover your face because the city is so ripped assunder.

What was MacThomais like?! I remember seeing him one day in the 1990s in what used to be Switzers, Grafton St., on the charm offensive with a couple of American tourists. He was rolling out the Dublinisms and they were lapping it up 🙂 A great oul character.

@Devin wrote:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VaA0LWRaNqY

Part 1 of Éamonn MacThomáis’s Dublin (get parts 2-8 in the related videos). Only 30 years ago but a completely different city. Seemingly every half a minute in these videos you want to cover your face because the city is so ripped assunder.

What was MacThomais like?! I remember seeing him one day in the 1990s in what used to be Switzers, Grafton St., on the charm offensive with a couple of American tourists. He was rolling out the Dublinisms and they were lapping it up 🙂 A great oul character.

His son Shane now does the guided tour of Glasnevin cemetary.

Eamon was a guest of the state (during the ’70s ?) for his Republican beliefs.

I’m really enjoying this thread.
I’m not sure if flickr accounts have been included yet but here is a link to photographs worth a look.

http://www.flickr.com/search/groups/?q=moore%20street&w=48889078629%40N01&m=pool

Does anyone have any further documentation of Moore St. of old please?

The shame of the birthplace of Richard Brindsley Sheridan (right of The Moy pub) allowed to fall into ruin.

some excellent before and after pictures here of Dublin that i thought would suit this thread. (hover mouse over old picture to get then the new picture)

http://www.photography.paul-walsh.net/landscape/Cushman/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/nlireland/

Cool movie of Dublin streets in ’82, including a drive down Grafton Street

Capel Street, from DCC Libraries site (http://dublincitypubliclibraries.com/image-galleries/digital-collections):

Looking for a shot of Denmark House, on Little Denmark Street. I recall seeing one maybe 20 years ago, but damned if I can find the book it was in.

Can’t recall seeing any decent pictures of Denmark Street. We are talking about the Denmark Street that was cleared and the site absorbed into the ILAC Center?

There was a history of Moore Street published before Christmas, perhaps there was something in that.

I came across this cutting from a newspaper which isn’t dated [but was in with other stuff from 1975] announcing the development of the Ilac Centre, which is interesting for the sheer time-warpiness of its modernity.

Yeah it was cleared for the ILAC. Do you have a larger scan of that – really deserves to go on main site.

Hey Paul:)

I have lost count of how many times I have seen a picture in a book and then months later when trying to find it realising I’ve forgotten which book it was in. In most cases it was some old publication in Rathmines Library!

I don’t recall seeing a decent photo of Denmark House, but I think there is a Line drawing in Pearsons “The Heart of Dublin”.

Nice pic of the ILAC Centre proposal, redolent of many developments in the UK in this era. Of course, the original plans for the ILAC (which I suspect this captures partly) were alot more grandiose. It encompassed twice the retail space, 400k sq ft as opposed to 200k sq ft, two 14 storey office blocks, a hotel , leisure centre and theatre!! Looking at the sketch above it would certainly not have been award winning architecturally, but, might have been preferable to the single storey flat roof utilitarian rubbish that was built…..a suburban mall plonkered into a prime City Centre location.

C

lol Gunter, I know what you mean by time warpiness……does it remind you slightly of the models used as streetscapes in the Thunderbirds Series…..a 60s take on what the world of tomorrow would look like:)

I see to recall reading somewhere about a concept with large plastic panels across the facade – am guessing this is it…

@Paul Clerkin wrote:

I seem to recall reading somewhere about a concept with large plastic panels across the facade – am guessing this is it…

I have that recollection too, but I’m not sure which version of the ILAC proposal was the classy one with plastic panels.

thebig C is correct, as reportedly approved, the ILAC was to have 400,000 sq. feet of retail space, a theatre, two cinemas, a restaurant and bar, sporting facilities and an office block.

Apologies for the picture resolution, the newsprint quality was great in the first place and time has taken its toll too.

This is a similarly upbeat announcement of that appalling office block on South Great George’s Street when it was still just an ‘artist impression’ and hadn’t yet become a concrete reality.

Great stuff Gunter….do you have many more of these Newspaper cuttings?

I am slightly confused though, was the “Smarts” Building previously part of Pims Department Store. I was always under the impression that Wicklow House ands Castle House were on the Pims site, afterall, based on Illustrations I have seen Pims was approx 20 bays in Length.

C

The guys who wrote those pieces in The Indo and Times, Frank Cairns and Karl Jones, get a mention In Destruction of Dublin – they were very developer friendly, maybe too friendly.

@thebig C wrote:

….do you have many more of these Newspaper cuttings?

o yes!

A good pic, in poor condition, of the site that was cleared [over many years] for the Stephen’s Green Shopping Centre, from a Sept. 1974 announcement of the latter’s impending arrival.

Note that the Corpo’s condition to double the width of South King Street was only scuppered by the intervention of the wise Mr. Tully.

The side article records the stylistic breakthrough that meant you could now purchase a new ‘Neo-Georgian’ house in Bray for £8,000. Castleknock style living, at back-end-of-Bray prices!

I’m going to have to put these away or I’ll get no work done today.

I like the Neo-Georgians sidebar

Great newspaper clippings. Frightening how the papers were such blatant mouthpieces for the development industry back then, though one wonders if the more subtle approach of today is even more invidious.

What a strong streetscape South King Street once boasted! A curiously unified looking terrace there along the site of the St. Stephen’s Green Centre. Certainly the street hosted some Regency-era facades and shopfronts until the second half of the 20th century on the opposing side, so perhaps this terrace was part of the wider trend of re-facing and rebuilding carried out in the retail boom of the early 1800s.

The clinging on with vice-gripped fingernails of the solitary late Georgian house on the corner of Dame Lane and South Great George’s Street, in the face of the Wicklow House monster devouring all its neighbours, is one of the few satisfying instances of discord in Dublin street architecture to emerge from the speculative butchering of the modern era. The survival of early shopfront fabric on both the front and side elevations makes it all the more gratifying to walk by. How on earth the place is still standing, especially going by the description of that basement, is beyond me. Do you have an exact date for that clipping, gunter? We do tend to forget how that terrace was developed in two phases, explaining its subtly varied, two-part approach to offending the human race.

I came across a detailed reference to Denmark House only recently, but now can’t find it. I believe it may have been in connection with the architect William M Mitchell, in whose repertoire it certainly wouldn’t be out of place as an early steel-framed building with a brick skin. There’s a picture of it in Freddie O’Dwyer’s Lost Dublin, but I can’t find that either. Very useful all round.

@GrahamH wrote:

Do you have an exact date for that clipping, gunter?

Most of the clipping do, but not that George’s Street block clip unfortunately. I must have felt that, either it didn’t merit going to the trouble of scribbling a date on it or, that it dated itself.

Probably not later than 1975.

@GrahamH wrote:

I came across a detailed reference to Denmark House only recently, but now can’t find it. I believe it may have been in connection with the architect William M Mitchell, in whose repertoire it certainly wouldn’t be out of place as an early steel-framed building with a brick skin. There’s a picture of it in Freddie O’Dwyer’s Lost Dublin, but I can’t find that either. Very useful all round.

A bikkie for Graham, ‘Lost Dublin’ page 79. It’s a pity the OPW wouldn’t buy Freddie a computer, we could get questions like this answered on the spot.

This is his caption:

‘To the right of Arnotts in the photograph may be seen the copper dome of Todd Burns [now Penneys] and further right, the dome, surmounted by a flagpole, of the Henry Street Warehouse Company latterly known as Denmark House, Little Denmark Street, an early steel-framed building which was demolished in 1976.’

For a better image, there’s a good chance that an early steel-framed building would have merited at least half a page in a book called ‘A Companion Guide to Architecture in Ireland, 1837 – 1921’, by Jeremy Williams, which I think was published about twenty years ago.

Hey Gang

Yes, the papers are unashamedly endorsing the case of “out with the old, in with the new”. However, nowadays, whilst opinion is slightly more informed it is nonetheless just as entrenched. For example, whilst there are still many who are avowedly pro-development, there are also a huge number who are basically anti-development and view any support for particular projects as treason. Its sad really, but we just don’t seem to have been able to strike a balance between the obvious need to preserve and protect and yet to let the City grow and florish.

Anywho, back to Gunters great clippings…..what can I say, it strikes me as weird that side by side there is one article holding forth about the benefits of faux Georgian living whilst in the other article the destruction of real Georgian is approved of……I doubt they saw the Irony:) Also, of note, is the tiny number of 29 apartments being proposed! No doubt these were either Social units or had to be forced on the developer kicking and screaming. These days we forget that in the 1970s people just did not want to live in the City Centre. Which is one of the reasons why countless perfectly good Georgian houses were demolished as opposed to being converted into 2-4 unit mansion blocks as happened elsewhere.

C

@Gunter……I don’t think the residents of Eglinton Rd would agree with the statement “wise Mr Tully”!!:)

@GrahamH…..Yes, I have seen relatively few pictures of the South King Street streetscape and I am surprised just how proportional and uniform it actually is.

Having said that, the St Stephens Green Centre is one of the better urban Shopping Centres around. Certainly in terms of public relm it leaves others in the halfpenny place. Its one massive failing is a total lack of shops facing directly onto South King Street….one wonders having read Gunters article was this a remenant of the original design were it would most likely have faced a Dual-Carraigeway?!

C

I have seen this one, I’d just like a see a photo where the building was more visible – terribly elusive.

Why Denmark House? Was it House as in a business premises…or was it a house as in home. This area was really always commercial right? And very slum ridden for much of late 19th and 20th centuries if old photos are correct.

It’s archiseek, Stephen, you don’t ask why!

@thebig C wrote:

Gunter……I don’t think the residents of Eglinton Rd would agree with the statement “wise Mr Tully”!!:)

I see you have a well thumbed copy of The Destruction of Dublin bigC

I’ve nothing else on Little Denmark Street other than this 1975 clip of the Roches Stores corner as it was about to be redeveloped.

caption says Liffey Street, which is what I think Little Denmark Street was generally called in common speech. The Old Roches building had lost its moulded window surrounds and superb shopfront by this time, which can still be glimpsed in the view of Henry Street published in Maurice Gorham’s ‘Dublin Old and New’ of, coincidentally, 1975

Oh what a streetscape! Beautiful shopfronts. The lovely bowed Roches looks like it pre-dated the 1916 destruction. That junction into Little Denmark Street made such a difference to the townscape here too. The indentation in the street line there today where the ILAC meets Debenhams is so unsatisfactory – unresolved, cheaply finished and plain functionless. How it terminates the Liffey Street vista is appalling. Woeful planning. It’s crying out for a street here. It’s a shame the legacy of Denmark Street wasn’t even preserved in the naming of the new ILAC malls, where ‘Denmark Mall’ would be so much more exotic than the prosaically titled ‘Mary Mall’.

So seemingly Roches was built in two stages, with the 1960s Cole’s Lane end the first to be developed? Do I recall a red curtain-walled end as the second phase, or was it a simple continuation of the chocolate square cladding used further down? Disturbing how quickly you forget these things. I did like the rather racy, vertically-fenestrated, chamfered corner to Cole’s Lane though. I think this Roches was also host to the first escalator in Dublin, if not Ireland.

That recent Moore Street publication did have a picture of Denmark House!

It’s probably not from the right angle though

what a great premises though

Great pic, and great building. Shame in a sense that it was hidden away on Denmark St.

BTW, I note references to the Liffey Street frontage of Roches….I assumed Liffey Street terminated at the junction with Henry St. This would seem to suggest that in times past it was in effect in “Upper/Lower” segments and formerly stretched beyond Henry St?

@Gunter….yep I do indeed have a very well thumbed copy of Destruction of Dublin. It actually took me quite a while to find but I eventually discovered a copy in the Second Hand bookshop in Blackrock:) In this case, McDonald waxed lyrical about the warren of streets and alleys replaced by the ILAC refering to them as “Dublins Kasbah”. As they dissappeared before my time I asked my Dad about them…..he is from Fenian Street (which was dog rough in his day), and he maintained the place was a dive and even he wouldn’t have been particularly comfortable there!!

C

Hi,
I am posting about the pictures of Linenhall Parade first put up in 2009. I only recently came across these on Google. The reason I am posting is because the woman at the front door of number 3 is my mother! I was also born and reared in that house. Some really interesting information from the various posts but I will try to add some new information. The square of houses comprising Linenhall Parade, Terrace, Lisburn Street and Coleraine Street were originally a Linenhall (where linen was sold). The Superintendent’s house still stands on Coleraine Street (Coleraine House). The Linenhall was taken over by the British Army and used as a barracks until it was burned down in 1916. It was really only an administrative barracks and appears to have unused by 1916. A man once approached my Grandmother in the garden and said he had taken the Kings Schilling at our house so we presume the Guard House must have been where our house was. According to my mother the industrial building to the right of the photo was a boarding school was Protestant Children and she remembered hearing children crying when he was growing up in the late 20’s, early 30’s. I would be very interested in anybody knows about this. Once last point, the steel windows all warped and my memories are of sticking newspapers in the gaps and scraping ice of the insides in winter. Good riddance!