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View of 45 Merrion Square from inside Merrion Square Park on a sunny afternoon in April 2025, with a clear blue sky behind the building.
11.04.25

IAA Easter Opening Hours 2025

The reading room and exhibitions will close on Thursday 17 April at 5pm and reopen on Tuesday 22 April 2025 at 10am. 

Portrait photograph of artst Bryony Dunne taken by Nonzuzo Gxekwa.
28.01.25

Artist in Residence 2025

Askeaton Contemporary Arts has announced a new artists-in-residence at the IAA.

A map of Ireland colour red due to the Red Warning issued by Met Éireann because of Storm Éowyn.
23.01.25

Storm Éowyn

Due to Storm Éowyn, the Irish Architectural Archive reading room and Architecture Gallery will be closed on Friday 24 January 2025. The Archive will reopen at 10am on Monday 27 January 2025.

02.01.25

Emo Court Collection Digitised

In 1780, John Dawson, Viscount Carlow and 1st Earl of Portarlington commissioned James Gandon to design a new mansion on his Co. Laois estate. Work progressed on the house from 1790, and the landscape was re-designed, but by the time of Dawson’s death in 1798, only the shell of the house was completed. Dawson’s son, the 2nd Earl of Portarlington, employed several architects to complete the work. From 1822 to 1831 Arthur and John Williamson produced designs for a kitchen wing and the north front portico which were unrealized. However, their scheme for the entrance portico was implemented. Lewis Vulliamy took over in the early 1830s. Vulliamy exhibited his designs for Emo at the Royal Academy in 1834 and produced working drawings for the north portico, as well as unexecuted designs kitchen wing. The 3rd Earl, who succeeded in 1845, employed William Caldbeck to decorate the rotunda, drawing room and library, build a bachelor’s wing above a new kitchen block and erect gate lodges. This work was completed in 1861. The complex architectural evolution of the house is reflected in the drawings in Emo Court Collection. These have now been digitised as are available via the IAA’s online catalogue.

17.12.24

Christmas Opening Hours 2024

The Archive will remain open until 12 noon on Monday 23 December 2024 and will reopen at 10am on Thursday 2 January 2025.

Workers laying the concrete roof the Gresham Hotel, Dublin, 1927
11.11.24

Gresham Hotel under construction

McLaughlin & Harvey’s ‘concrete squad’ tamping a section of freshly poured concrete on the roof of the Gresham Hotel, 1927.

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D02 VY60

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