Parnell Square

Parnell Square is an important Georgian square sited at the northern end of O'Connell Street, and west of Mountjoy Square, in the city of Dublin, Ireland. Formerly named Rutland Square, it was renamed after Charles Stewart Parnell (1846–1891), as was Parnell Street, which forms the southern side of the square. Surrounded on three sides by terraces of original intact Georgian houses, much of the southern part of the square and its centre is taken up by extensions of the Rotunda Hospital. The Garden of Remembrance is located along the northern side of this area. Its main entrance is on the eastern side of the square, with a smaller entrance on the northern side of the square.

 

In the south easterly corner of the square, where it meets with O'Connell Street, is sited the Gate Theatre, and the Ambassador and Pillar Room venues. Entertainments were originally developed here as part of the Rotunda Hospital scheme by Bartholomew Mosse as a revenue engine to pay for the running of what was Europe's first lying-in maternity hospital. Extensive pleasure gardens, subsequently forming the body of the square, were located to the rear of the hospital in the original development.

 

The Hugh Lane Gallery is on the north side of the square. It was erected in cut stone by Lord Charlemont to a design by William Chambers during the Georgian period. On this side also is the Dublin Writers Museum and the Irish Writers' Centre. The striking Gothic Revival Findlater's Church just up from the gallery on the same side was erected in the 1860s by Alexander Findlater, at his own expense, and which he presented to the Presbyterian congregation. The James Joyce Centre is located nearby on North Great Georges Street, a street notably rich for its Georgian houses as is the nearby and historic Mountjoy Square.