Henrietta Street in Dublin is the best street for illuminating the city's past. Within the 300 years of their existence, the enormous homes on this cobblestone street have ranged from Georgian magnificence to tenement squalor. The museum at 14 Henrietta Street has now been refurbished. It describes how the house changed from serving as the elegant home of a family of four in the 1720s to housing more than 100 people by 1911. The experience also includes a significant amount of research background and individual anecdotes.
Consider 50% of the museum collection is the building itself, but the research history and human tales are also a major part of the experience. This has made the residents an integral element of the narrative—a story of the people we don't typically see in museums. It is a replica of the infamous 1913 John Cooke pictures, complete with grey army jackets used as bed covers.
The 1960s apartment of Mrs. Dowling, the final occupant of 14 Henrietta Street, has been meticulously renovated, right down to the floor's lino. On a bedpost are toy guns and a laundry wringer in a corridor. Museums now treasure once-commonplace items. People run to long-lost items that remind them of their childhood due to the clarity of the detail on display. The locals were affected by all the significant historical events in Ireland. The Act of Union of 1801 dispersed the parliament and aristocracy of Dublin. The destitute then moved in large numbers to the city during the Great Famine.
These historical milestones are ones that many of us are already familiar with. The influence is seen in the little stories of the city here at 14 Henrietta Street, though.
Just inside the front entrance of 14 Henrietta Street lies a nail that was left in place during the ten-year restoration project, patiently waiting for the day when the reason for its existence would be revealed.
It involves making decisions about what stays and what departs. How can the history of this structure's occupants be revealed without eliminating one to emphasize another? It was a process of patiently exposing Georgian stucco by holding fast to fragments of wallpaper buried under bookcases.
Stroll around the first floor's vast chambers. The wooden floors are uneven because hundreds of feet walk on them over time. The grand splendor of the house is displayed in the mint green drawing room's lofty ceilings. Since Luke Gardiner, a real estate developer, initially constructed Number 14 as a section of Dublin's most fashionable street, this has been present. But as the aristocracy departed, the home began to fall apart.
The Raddle Red and Reckitts Blue of the tenement era are used to paint the walls in this area. Women initially used the red on the walls as cheek rouge. Then, you descend the back staircase, where the fence was stolen for firewood during a time of need. The building had no plumbing, so there were 94 steps to climb with buckets and bedpans.
Duration Required14 Henrietta Street, Dublin, Ireland
4.6
