The earliest recorded iron bridge in Ireland and originally known as the Wellington Bridge in honour of the Irish-born victor of Waterloo, Dublin’s pedestrian Ha’penny Bridge opened a year after that battle, in 1816: its popular name comes from the toll originally charged to users traversing the Liffey. The structure was ordered from the foundry at Coalbrookdale, Shropshire and it is believed one of the company’s foremen John Windsor was responsible for its elegant, and much-photographed, design. One of the details which is often missed is the line of miniature urns atop the balustrade. Of late the structure has suffered from the global fashion for smothering it with ‘love’ padlocks, those engaged in the activity so blinded by ardour, one assumes, that they fail to appreciate the corrosive damage being done to the metal (not to mention the disfigurement of the bridge).