Lime in ireland – Buildings

Lime kiln – Timogue, co. Laois

Remainings of an old lime kiln in the little village of Timogue. Kilns in Ireland were of two types: standing or running. County Cork had a prodigious number of kilns: at the end of the XVIII century it is thought the county had around 23000 in operation. Thanks to OSM for History Buff channel . Watch a video here

Tower House, Castelger, co. Galway

Renovation of a towerhouse dated back to XV century and a annex building from XIX century. Masonry by The Old Builders Company. Removal of all concrete plasters, renders and pointings. Use of NHL based mixture, stoneworks, roof repairing, thermal plasters. More infos here.

Farmhouse, Borris St. Mullins, co. Carlow

Renovation of a big traditional Farmhouse, XVIII century. Removal of concrete plasters, renders and mortars, new building with traditional materials, NHL based mixture, thermal plasters, stoneworks with local granite stones, particula attention is paid to solve cold bridging. More infos here.

City Assembly House, 58 South William Street, Dublin

The building was erected between 1766 and 1771 by the Society of Artist Ireland. Is a typical georgian style building. Now hosts the Irish Georgian Society. It has an octagonal shaped exhibition room that served as the first purpose built public exhibition gallery in Ireland and Britain.

20 St. Domick Street, Dublin

Renovation of building in Georgian Style. Those houses seems very simple outside: bricks facades, no windows decorations, only a monumental door entrance. Interiors are highly decorated. This was the residence of master stucco craftsman Robert West, and is considered to be one of the grandest 18th century townhouses in Dublin. >The stucco works, supposely made by West, are in every room of the house. Now is proprierty of Youth Work Ireland. The renovation involved all exterior and interiors walls, decoration, including wigging. Watch a video here.

Heuston Station, St. John’s Road West, Dublin

Renovation of stucco decoration in the hall of Heuston Station, (1846) by Griffin Plastering. Lime, casting plaster, pigments. The ceiling was hidden by a lower gypsum ceiling, so plasterworks were in really bad conditions, some of them had to be replaced using the original techinique. It was also restored the lath and plaster ceiling.

14 Henrietta Street, Dublin

One of the wealthy, luxuriouos georgian buildings of Dublin builit in late 1740s, after abandoned* and, in XX century, converted in a “tenement” for poor people. In XX century here lived up to 100 people, with only one toilet, arranging an apartment for each room. Now is a museum. The restoration partially restored interiors as they were in 1700s. Some rooms are left in the poor condition of 1900s. Bookign required https://14henriettastreet.ie/

*After the Acts of Union were passed in Great Britain and Ireland in 1801, all power shifted to London and most politically and socially significant residents were drawn from Georgian Dublin to Regency London.

Goethe Institut, 37 Merrion Square, Dublin

A georgian building in the central Marrion Square, built in 1760s, now owned by Goethe Institut Ireland. Griffin Plastering was contracted to carry out all the internal and external plaster restoration/conservation work. These works include removing all paint from the beautiful 18th century plasterwork (cornicing, friezes and decorative ceilings), traditional lime plastering internally and externally, lath and plaster, consolidate ceiling and crack repairs. More infos here.

Pearson Distillery, house and pub, St. James Street, Dublin

The builing dates back to 1780s, it is located in the Liberties District, in the area of the Church of Saint James, just behind Guinness Factory. Griffin Plastering
was contracted to carry out external traditional
lime rendering to the rear of the Houses, to repair the Historic pub shopfront and to cover with
thermal plaster (Ecocork) all internal walls of the houses . The decorative mouldings and shopfront were in lime and not in timber. They were in bad state, all existing paint was removed and they were renovated using only lime based mortars.

Pointing

The filling of joints between sotnes or bricks in walls. Because external walls are exposed to (bad) weather, the pointing can decays. During the last century most of buildings ware repointed with cement, diminishing the breathability of the wall. In addition the pointing was often incorrect, offering to water the possibility to remains into the building, instead of goes away.

Wigging

This is a distinctively Irish variation on ‘tuck pointing’, the general term used to describe the pointing of irregular brickwork to give the effect of expensive, finely gauged brick. It was a process used during the 17th-19th centuries to disguise inconsistencies in handmade brick burnt in ‘clamps’ – essentially large, covered mounds – which produced bricks of varied quality.
Orizontal joints are normally larger than vertical ones (Dublin style).

House in timber and lime, Bellevue Island Bridge, Dublin

Detached gable-fronted single-bay two-storey house, built c.1920, having gable to south elevation and double-pile extension to rear elevation. The gate pier adjoining it suggests that this building may have served as a gate lodge for the adjacent mill complex. More infos here