Monthly Archives: November 2020

The Irish Country House in the 21st Century


So, as 2020 draws to a close, how stands the Irish country house? Indeed, in some instances, does it still stand at all? Certainly, the past couple of decades have produced a great deal of information on the subject, and today much more is known about our historic properties, thanks to considerable scrupulous research and many recent publications (the Irish Aesthete has a shelf-long list of new books on his Christmas wish list). But does our being better informed lead to these buildings being better appreciated, and better cherished?




Certainly, there are instances where Irish country houses have been scrupulously restored, both by the state and private individuals. And many of those who have inherited such properties valiantly continue to devote themselves to making sure this legacy will pass to the next generation. What supports exist to assist them in the undertaking? What are the obstacles, what the challenges?




But other country houses have been lost – and a considerable number remain at risk of loss. To what extent does Ireland pay lip service to its architectural heritage? When it comes to our country houses, how well – if at all – is existing legislation enforced? What protection do they enjoy from decay or ill-conceived alterations? Are owners who fail to look after their historic properties taken to task? And are those who do make an effort duly rewarded?




So many and such complex questions. I shall be attempting to tease out a few of the answers in an online lecture available on the Irish Georgian Society website for a week (only) from tomorrow, December 1st called ‘The Irish Country House in the 21st century: Ruins and Restoration’. You can find more information on www.igs.ie/events (Please note, there is a fee for viewing, and you must book before 3pm tomorrow).

Left Standing



And the remains of a third medieval church in County Kilkenny, this one about four miles to the south of Newtown Jerpoint in Knocktopher. St David’s was founded by Griffin FitzWilliam (mentioned earlier this week for having established the settlement of Newtown Jerpoint) and occupied by Augustinian Canons Regular. Following the Dissolution of the Monasteries, at least some of the building survived as a place of worship for members of the Established Church but in the late 1820s they moved to another site and most of this older church either fell or was pulled down. What survives is a section of the north wall incorporating a 15th century window and an altar tomb beneath, and the former entrance tower to the west: this has a square trunk but the upper section is octagonal and castellated, so might have been added in the 18th century to give the church a more whimsical character. Inside the tower is a double funeral effigy of a man and a woman, also believed to date from the 15th century. The rest of the site is given over to graves


More New to Old



Still in County Kilkenny, and around seven miles west of Newtown Jerpoint (see last Monday) is another Newtown: when it came to naming places in this part of the country, someone wasn’t feeling terribly imaginative. In this instance, the remains include a tower house, officially dating from the 1620s but by general consent probably constructed at least 100 years earlier, perhaps for the Sweetmans who were a dominant family in this part of the country. Rising four storeys, the building is fairly plain (hence the suggestion that it dates from well before the 17th century) and as usual is accessed by a single arched doorcase with a murder hole immediately inside. Not far away lie the ruins of a late-mediaeval church, the surrounding graveyard still in use as is so often the case in Ireland. Dedicated to All Saints, the building’s only surviving feature is a window on the east gable. Internally, much of the ground is covered with the remains of old tombstones. 


From New to Old


Jerpoint, County Kilkenny is home to the remains of one of the country’s best-known medieval Cistercian abbeys (see: https://theirishaesthete.com/2016/12/12/majestic-in-its-ruins). But less than a mile to the west lies another fascinating site, today called Jerpoint Park. Here, at the time when the monastery flourished, was a small busy urban centre, called Newtown Jerpoint, which has since all but disappeared, its remains only cleared of vegetation in recent years. The settlement here is thought to have been founded towards the end of the 12th century, either by William Marshall, Earl of Pembroke (also responsible for building the core of what is today Kilkenny Castle) or by another Norman knight, Griffin FitzWilliam, a brother of Raymond le Gros. 





Newtown Jerpoint seems to have reached its peak in the mid-15th century when it contained some 27 residential dwellings, a courthouse, woollen mill, tannery and brewery. One suspects that the town’s fortunes were closely connected with those of the nearby abbey (that woollen mill probably used raw material provided by the Cistercians, who were renowned for their sheep farms). So with the advent of the Dissolution of the Monasteries in the mid-16th century, Newtown Jerpoint likely went into decline and never recovered. It would appear that even by the 17th century it had ceased to function (the larger urban centre of Thomastown, less than two miles to the north-east, would have absorbed much of its business). And so it largely disappeared and today scant traces survive except for the remains of a parish church, dedicated to St Nicholas. 





By the late 18th century, the lands on which Newtown Jerpoint had stood were owned by the Lowry-Corrys, who became Earls of Belmore. At some date, seemingly around 1775, a range of outbuildings were erected here, incorporating stables and service quarters. Then in 1817 the second earl built the Grand Yard at his main residence, Castle Coole, County Fermanagh; this was designed by architect Richard Morrison. It may have been around the same time that the second earl also commissioned Morrison to produce designs for the lodge at Jerpoint, as drawings exist of a three-bay, two-storey building of this character. However, it appears the lodge was never constructed and instead the existing property adapted as a residence; this stands on high ground above the ruins of St Nicholas’ church. When the present owners bought the place, the medieval site was completely overgrown, but since 2012 they have undertaken huge amounts of work to clear the old buildings of ivy and make it accessible to interested visitors. Just outside the church, a large early 14th century tomb slab with low relief carving of a bishop is supposed to mark the burial place of St Nicholas, Bishop of Myra who died in the year 343. According to local legend, the saint is buried here in Jerpoint, his bones having been brought to Ireland by crusaders. This story is likely to be disputed by the burghers of Bari in southern Italy, where the the aforementioned Nicholas’ relics have been preserved in the Basilica di San Nicola since 1087. But that shouldn’t deter anyone from making a pilgrimage to County Kilkenny and experiencing first-hand the delights of Jerpoint Park.


For more information, see: https://jerpointpark.com

On the Market


A further example of urban decay in Ireland: the Market House in Portarlington, County Laois. Standing in the centre of a square from which radiate four roads, the building dates from the early years of the 18th century and reflects the town’s prosperity at the time. Readers outside Ireland may be startled to know that for several decades this significant monument to Portarlington’s past operated as a garage where cars were serviced and repaired; for Irish readers, the information will come as no surprise, since it is typical of how we are inclined to treat our architectural heritage. Last July the local authority came to an arrangement with the owners of the market house, taking it over on a long lease. The intention, presumably, is to restore the building and put it to more sympathetic use. But much more needs to be done if such a project is to realise its full potential. At the moment, there are several substantial properties around the surrounding square in various stages of neglect and decay, most critically Arlington House, a five-bay, three storey 18th century house currently vacant (and with a long-time empty lot beside it), also the former Church of Ireland church, and adjacent to that a former cinema dating from the 1940s. Much of the square’s space is given over to car parking, and near-constant traffic discourages pedestrians from exploring the site. If this square and market house were elsewhere in Europe, their full potential would be exploited as a centrepiece for urban renewal and as a means of encouraging visitors to Portarlington. Let’s wait to see what the county council now does with the building and what is for now a bleak and desolate setting…
Incidentally, the Irish branch of the Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings (SPAB) is now running a Maintenance Week with plenty of advice and help for owners of historic properties. Find out more through the organisation’s twitter account (@SPABIreland) or Instagram page (@spabireland). 


Less Talk, More Action



There has been much talk in recent years of the decline of Ireland’s town centres, visible in examples such as that shown above. This house sits in the middle of Erskine Terrace on Farnham Street in Cavan. Dating from the late Georgian period when the Maxwell family, Lords Farnham took an interest in the town, it is today in a state of sad neglect and a blight on the rest of the terrace. Further north on the same street and adjacent to the Roman Catholic cathedral of SS Patrick and Felim is the former presbytery (see below) which it appears was once an early 19th century three-storey house with pitched roof but converted into the present two-storey flat-roofed building in 1962. Like the other property to the south, it stands empty and forlorn, doing nothing to improve the character of the town.
So, what is to be done? The Heritage Council has recently launched a new Podcast series called Putting Town Centres First (https://www.heritagecouncil.ie/projects/podcast-series-putting-town-centres-first). No doubt admirable in its intent, one has to ask what practical difference this series will make. Discussions about urban decline, conferences, reports and analyses: all have been going on for decades with no visible solution to the problem under consideration. There has been much hand-wringing but little real change. Last month in the Irish Times, economist David McWilliams wrote an article in which he stated bluntly that dereliction ‘is vandalism for the property-owning classes’ and that the country’s huge numbers of neglected buildings ‘send out a signal of decay and reveal an enormously wasteful attitude to capital.’ (https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/david-mcwilliams-the-rules-of-the-property-game-have-changed-1.4382088). Returning to the subject a couple of weeks later, McWilliams noted that some 15% of the country’s total building stock, almost 200,00 properties, are at present lying empty and neglected, and that in a little over a year 11 buildings had collapsed in the middle of Cork city. He then proposed a simple solution to resolving the issue: ‘use it or lose it’ legislation. Under this proposal, property that is being actively used, ideally for residential purposes, ‘is rewarded with preferential treatment, but one that is vacant is taxed. If the owner can’t pay that tax, the property faces a compulsory purchase order by the State, which then puts it on the market.’ (https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/david-mcwilliams-a-plan-to-put-ireland-s-200-000-vacant-buildings-to-use-1.4394673). Sounds radical? Yes indeed, but despite all those conferences and reports and now podcasts, no one else has yet come up with a better solution. The simple question is this: should private individuals be permitted to desecrate the public environment by failing to maintain their property? At what point does it become unacceptable for private interest to trump public good? Talk may salve consciences but solves nothing. There is really no need for any more of it. If Ireland’s town centres are to have a viable future, and our collective architectural heritage preserved, what’s required is decisive – and perhaps radical – action. Otherwise the number of buildings looking like these examples in Cavan will continue to rise.


Blowing in the Wind I


Last January, the Irish Times reported that a land parcel of 800 acres in County Tipperary was being offered for sale as a single lot with an asking price of €11 million. According to the article, ‘a wide range of investors and land speculators are expected to express their interest in the sale.’ The reason for that interest, and the figure this parcel was expected to make, arises from the fact that the site contains two substantial clusters of wind turbines (18 and 12 respectively), with a third now underway and expected to active in two years’ time. The turbines were originally developed by a mining company which, between 1999 and 2015 extracted zinc and lead from the ground. Long before the mine closed, in 2009 the company embarked on developing the first group of wind turbines, the second commissioned in 2013. The operation of this business is managed by another body, a Canadian-based global fund called Brookfield Renewable Partners, which in 2016 struck a ten-year deal with Facebook to provide its energy needs: the latest cluster of wind turbines here will generate power for Facebook’s  data centre campus in Clonee, Co Meath, and its new European headquarters in Ballsbridge, Dublin.





Killoran House stands less than a mile from the Lisheen wind farms. For many hundreds of years the land here belonged to members of the Campy or Campie family, the first of whom was a soldier Solomon Camby, originally from Norfolk it seems, whose name is mentioned in reports of the Battle of Marston Moor (July 1644) when Parliamentary forces defeated the Royalist army. He was then a member of the cavalry regiment that came to be known as the Ironsides; Camby was part of what was called the ‘Maiden Troop’ headed by Captain Robert Swallow and drawn from Norwich. Subsequently in 1649 he came to Ireland as part of the New Model Army and was involved in crushing opposition here; he appears to have been in County Mayo in 1653 when English troops attempted to burn down Ballintubber Abbey. Like many other soldiers, he was rewarded for his services in land, and this was confirmed by the post-Restoration English government in 1667 when Major Solomon Camby was granted over 1,700 acres in the barony of Lower Ormond, County Tipperary and some 90 acres in the barony of Forth, County Wexford. One may assume that the original Solomon Camby was a staunch Protestant, but in the 18th century one of his descendants married a member of the Lalor family, who had always remained Roman Catholic. By the time Solomon Lalor Cambie inherited the former Lalor estate at Killoran in the following century he must also have been a Catholic (since he was educated by the Jesuits at Clongowes Wood College). His land holding ran to almost 1,600 acres and it was probably for this reason that he decided to build a new residence for himself.





Killoran House dates from around 1850, and is a typical solid gentleman’s residence of the period, with an extensive yard to one side of the building. The three-bay, two storey entrance front is curious because the centre bay entrance projection has its door around one side. The front, on the other hand, is taken up by a large and elaborate fanlight window; inside, the space directly above acts as an additional room off the landing, accessed via a pair of shuttered doors. Otherwise the interior is, again, typical of the time although the cantilevered staircase is lighter than usually the case for the mid-19th century. Currently on the market, the house is in a very poor state of repair, and looks to have been left empty for quite some time. Many of the windows are broken and slates missing from the roof. As a consequence, large quantities of rain water have entered the building and some upper floors have collapsed. Almost all the interior fittings like chimney pieces have been removed. Surrounded as it is by wind turbines, and with more due to be added to their number shortly, Killoran House’s prospects do not look cheering. The property is, naturally, included on the local authority’s list of protected structures.


Apologies to anyone who looked at this earlier when the text was missing…

A Good Barracking



And today’s example of wasted public resources comes courtesy of Longford County Council. Dating from 1815, the former cavalry barracks in Longford town are believed to have been designed by John Behan, a measurer and architect (and timber merchant) employed by the Board of Works on such military properties. Historically, this is the most important area in the town, since it is where the dominant family, the O’Farrells built a castle (the last parts of which were demolished in the early 1970s: a shopping centre can now be found there instead). In the 17th century, Francis Aungier converted at least part of the site into a manor house with surrounding gardens, building a market house and square immediately adjacent. In 1774 his descendant sold the property to the British authorities for development as a military barracks. Post-Independence, these were occupied by the Irish army until 2009. Three years later, the buildings on some 5.1 hectares were bought by the county council for €450,000, since when the cavalry barracks has sat empty. A number of smaller ancillary blocks to the rear are used by local groups and there’s a large open field running down to the river Camlin. The same questions arise: why do local authorities purchase these places and then leave them unused for so long, meaning that whenever an eventual use is found, the relevant costs are higher? And what sort of example does this set to other owners of historic properties when the county council fails to take adequate care of an important building it owns? Only question always has the same answer. Who’ll eventually have to foot the bill? Answer: the Irish taxpayer.



Taken to Court



One of the most perfect neo-classical buildings in Ireland: the Courthouse in Carlow town. Constructed of local granite, the courthouse was designed in 1830 by William Vitruvius Morrison and in part funded by the Bruen family who lived not far away at Oak Park (see https://theirishaesthete.com/2020/10/03/oak-park-2) and who employed the same architect to design their own house. The building stands in the centre of a wide platform approached by two flights of steps. Its pedimented facade featuring a recessed entrance behind eight giant Ionic columns was inspired by the Temple of Illisus in Athens, believed to date from the mid-5th century BC, but destroyed by the Turks in the late 18th century and known only from the work of James Stuart and Nicholas Revett who had recorded the temple a few years before it was lost. The same fate seemed to threaten Carlow’s courthouse towards the end of the last century after it had fallen into a poor state of repair, but thankfully a full restoration was undertaken and it continues to serve its original purpose and to grace the town of Carlow.

Another World


Powerscourt, 1925

Frank Browne, better known as Fr Browne, was without doubt the finest photographer working in Ireland during the middle decades of the last century. Taking some 42,000 pictures, all of which he carefully catalogued before his death in 1960, he left behind an astonishingly rich record of daily life throughout the country over that period. Even more remarkably, photography began, and remained, an extra-curricular hobby because Frank Browne was first and foremost a Jesuit priest. His activities as a photographer had to be fitted in – and sometimes set aside – as and when was required by his superiors in the order. This makes his achievement in the medium all the more impressive. It is clear that he could have made a comfortable living from his work, but chose not to do so. All financial compensation he received for his work, and during certain busy periods the amounts were substantial, he was not permitted to retain: the money was immediately forwarded to the Provincial Treasurer of the Jesuit order. Among the payments he received were those for a series of images of Ireland’s country houses, commissioned by the Irish Tatler & Sketch. Published monthly, the photographs were accompanied by Browne’s own texts, in which he discussed the building in question and its history. It says a great deal about the man’s character that he managed to gain the trust of so many owners, who allowed him access to their properties, which were then still private and not open to the public. The pictures he took on these occasions are a fantastic but hitherto insufficiently explored resource, since they show interiors of many houses either since lost or radically altered. What’s particularly interesting is to look at how such buildings, still occupied by their original families, were then furnished as it is indicative of decorative taste at the time, often little altered from the 19th century. The pictures also provide viewers with a wistful awareness of what has been lost, usually sold at auction and frequently taken out of the country. Some of these images are included in a newly-published book, Wandering Wicklow with Father Browne, and they are shown here.





Killruddery, 1947

Killruddery, County Wicklow is today one of Ireland’s most popular and visited country houses, enjoying the benefits of being located on the edge of Dublin. It has been home to successive generations of the Brabazon family, Earls of Meath, since the early 17th century. The core of the building dates from that period, but heavily encased in a number of later additions, the most substantial being made by father and son architects Richard and William Vitruvius Morrison during the 1820s when they greatly enlarged the house and transformed its exterior to resemble an immense Tudor mansion, further alterations being made some forty years later when William Slater added a Dutch gable and Oriel window to the south front. A decade earlier, the present conservatory was constructed, replacing an earlier one that was part of the Morrisons’ contribution. Browne’s photographs were taken in 1947 when all of this was still in place. But just a few years later, extensive dry rot was discovered in parts of the building and the fourteenth Earl of Meath took the decision that demolition was the only option. Accordingly, in the early 1950s the entire entrance front on the north side was pulled down and the remainder remodelled by Claud Phillimore. At least a third of the house was lost including the double-height entrance hall seen here, along with an equally monumental dining room and other spaces. Browne’s pictures provide an invaluable record of how Killruddery appeared before these revolutionary changes were instigated.





Shelton Abbey, 1947

The Howard family came from the village of Shelton in Nottinghamshire, and remembered this when they chose to name their Irish house Shelton Abbey. The original building here is thought to have been constructed for Ralph Howard, first Viscount Wicklow, in the mid-1750s, its design attributed to English architect Matthew Brettingham. In 1819 Howard’s grandson, William-Forward Howard, 4th Earl of Wicklow invited the Morrisons père et fils to remodel the building so that it might resemble ‘an Abbey erected in the fourteenth century, and…formed into a baronial residence shortly after the Reformation’ although the architects complained the result was less perfect than they might have wished since the owner wished to retain as much as possible of the original fabric. Some of the interiors, such as the library and dining room, retained their classical decoration but others, not least the main drawing room, were made over in Tudor Gothic style with wonderful fan vaulted ceilings. During the 1740s the first Ralph Howard had undertaken a Grand Tour during which he was painted by Pompeo Batoni and acquired a number of old master works and antiquities. Subsequent further generations of the family married well and added to Shelton Abbey’s contents so that by the time the eighth, and last, Earl of Wicklow inherited the place it was filled with treasures. Unfortunately, his bank balance was less well stocked and in 1947 he decided to open his home as an hotel. Just before this happened, Browne was invited to photograph the building, the first such job he undertook for Irish Tatler & Sketch. His pictures therefore show Shelton Abbey when still a private property. Sadly, the earl’s scheme was not a success  – it was perhaps too early for the allure of a country house hotel to be appreciated – and in 1950 he made the decision to sell the estate. A sale of the contents duly followed and took an astonishing 13 days, an indication of how impressive they were, with dealers coming from England and the United States to snatch up many bargains. Today Shelton Abbey is an open prison and its interiors, bereft of their former contents, have suffered from indifferent maintenance. This gives Browne’s pictures a particular poignancy, not least one showing Mr Virtue, the house’s long-serving butler, looking apprehensively out the front door as he awaits the arrival of paying guests.


Humewood, 1947

Wandering Wicklow with Father Browne is published by Messenger Publications (www.messenger.ie) and now available in all good bookshops.