FÁILTE - WELCOME

Welcome to the BLOG of the Limerick Chapter
 of the Irish Georgian Society

The aims of the Irish Georgian Society [IGS] are to encourage an interest in, and to promote the preservation of, distinguished examples of architecture and the allied arts in Ireland.

The Society, based in Dublin, has local Chapters in Ireland, England and the United States. In Ireland there are Chapters in Birr, Cork and Limerick.

The Limerick Chapter serves members of the IGS living in the Mid-West.
We organise lectures, outings and exhibitions throughout the year.

For more information about the Limerick Chapter please contact 

Dr Ursula Callaghan
urscal@gmail.com

Conolly Folly

Designed by architect Richard Castle, (1695-1751), this soaring obelisk supported by a series of arches beneath stands 140 feet tall. It was erected in 1740 by Katherine Conolly to provide employment, during the severe winter and subsequent famine of 1739/40, for the starving Castletown tenantry.

My Sister is now building an obleix to answer a vistow from the bake of Castletown house; it will cost her three or four hundred pounds at least, but I believe more. I really wonder how she can dow so much and live as she duse.  [Mary Jones March 1740].

 In 1960, then in a ruinous state, it was acquired by the recently reconstituted Irish Georgian Society and its restoration was their first major project. In 1989 Mariga Guinness, one of the Society’s co-founders was buried beneath one of the side arches. It is the emblem of the Society.