North Earl Street (
Irish
Irish may refer to:
Common meanings
* Someone or something of, from, or related to:
** Ireland, an island situated off the north-western coast of continental Europe
***Éire, Irish language name for the isle
** Northern Ireland, a constituent unit ...
: ''Sráid an Iarla Thuaidh'') is a short stretch of city-centre street located on
Dublin's Northside
Northside or North Side may refer to:
Music
* Northside (band), a musical group from Manchester, England
* NorthSide, an American record label
* NorthSide Festival (Denmark), a music festival in Aarhus, Denmark
* "Norf Norf", a 2015 song by Vinc ...
and formerly a major shopping area. It runs from Marlborough Street in the west to
O'Connell Street
O'Connell Street () is a street in the centre of Dublin, Ireland, running north from the River Liffey. It connects the O'Connell Bridge to the south with Parnell Street to the north and is roughly split into two sections bisected by Henry S ...
beside the
Spire
A spire is a tall, slender, pointed structure on top of a roof of a building or tower, especially at the summit of church steeples. A spire may have a square, circular, or polygonal plan, with a roughly conical or pyramidal shape. Spires a ...
.
History
The street was built on land previously owned by
St. Mary's Abbey. It was acquired by
Henry Moore, 1st Earl of Drogheda
Henry Moore, 1st Earl of Drogheda PC (I) (died 11 January 1676) was an Anglo-Irish peer, politician and soldier.
Moore was the son of Charles Moore, 2nd Viscount Moore of Drogheda, by his wife Hon. Alice Loftus, the youngest daughter of Adam ...
in 1614 and sold to
Luke Gardiner
Luke Gardiner (c. 1690 – 25 September 1755) was an Irish property developer and politician.
In the Irish House of Commons he represented Tralee from 1725 until 1727 and Thomastown from 1727 until his death in 1755. He was appointed to the I ...
in 1714. It was developed in the late 18th century and named after the earl whose estate lands and developments are reflected in the street names bearing his name,
Henry Street,
Moore Street
Moore Street (; ) is a street in central Dublin, Ireland, off Henry Street, one of Ireland's main shopping streets. The famous Moore Street open-air fruit and vegetable market is Dublin's oldest food market. The market there is a famous landm ...
, Of Lane (now Off Lane) and Drogheda Street. North Earl Street was a direct continuation of Henry Street eastwards. It was sometimes formerly called Earl Street North.
The
Dublin Tramways Company built a tramline in the 1870s which ran along the street, continuing onto
Talbot Street
Talbot Street (; ) is a city-centre street located on Dublin's Northside, near to Dublin Connolly railway station. It was laid out in the 1840s and a number of 19th-century buildings still survive. The Irish Life Mall is on the street.
Locati ...
to
Amiens Street and north to
Dollymount
Dollymount (), often known as "Dollyer" to Dubliners, is a coastal suburban area on the north coast of Dublin Bay, within Clontarf, on the northside of Dublin, Ireland, just east of Saint Anne's Park.
Dollymount Strand
The famous Wooden Bri ...
and beyond.
Alexander Thom
Alexander Thom (26 March 1894 – 7 November 1985) was a Scottish engineer most famous for his theory of the Megalithic yard, categorisation of stone circles and his studies of Stonehenge and other archaeological sites.
Life and work Early ...
of ''Thom's Directory'' moved his printing business to 21 North Earl Street in 1828, where he operated a shop as a printer, bookseller and stationer.
Easter Rising and Independence
During the
Easter Rising in 1916, North Earl Street was badly damaged along with O'Connell Street and Henry Street. By the second day of the uprising, many of the buildings were on fire and businesses were being looted. Much of the street was reconstructed from 1917 onwards, with Edwardian
Baroque or Empire Revival style by architects such as O'Callaghan & Webb. These buildings are characterised by their use of classical facades with brick and granite. Madigans Pub was also rebuilt at this time, and contains some stained-glass windows by
Harry Clarke
Henry Patrick Clarke (17 March 1889 – 6 January 1931) was an Irish stained-glass artist and book illustrator. Born in Dublin, he was a leading figure in the Irish Arts and Crafts Movement.
His work was influenced by both the Art Nouveau an ...
. During this rebuilding,
Dublin Corporation
Dublin Corporation (), known by generations of Dubliners simply as ''The Corpo'', is the former name of the city government and its administrative organisation in Dublin since the 1100s. Significantly re-structured in 1660-1661, even more sign ...
widened parts of both North Earl Street and Henry Street. In total, 11 buildings on the Street and a further 3 on Earl Place needed full reconstruction.
Some of the Georgian buildings further away from the junction with O'Connell Street survived 1916, and form part of the older streetscape. These include a townhouse on the corner of Marlborough Street from the late 1780s. Other buildings feature Victorian stucco fronts.
As part of a wider set of proposals to rename a number of Dublin streets in 1921, it was proposed that North Earl Street be renamed
Brian Boru
Brian Boru ( mga, Brian Bóruma mac Cennétig; modern ga, Brian Bóramha; 23 April 1014) was an Irish king who ended the domination of the High Kingship of Ireland by the Uí Néill and probably ended Viking invasion/domination of Ireland. Br ...
Street in a report by the Dublin Corporation street naming committee. This new naming scheme was not implemented.
Regeneration
![Joice a Dublino](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e7/Joice_a_Dublino.JPG)
North Earl Street was pedestrianised in the 1980s along with a number of other city centre streets. It was officially opened as a "pedestrian precinct" in December 1980. A statue of
James Joyce
James Augustine Aloysius Joyce (2 February 1882 – 13 January 1941) was an Irish novelist, poet, and literary critic. He contributed to the modernist avant-garde movement and is regarded as one of the most influential and important writers of ...
by
Marjorie Fitzgibbon was installed on the street in 1990. It was commissioned by the Dublin City Centre Business Association and was unveiled on 16 June 1990. The statue is known colloquially as "the prick with the stick".
The hearing-aid store, Bonovox at 9 North Earl Street, is reputedly the inspiration for Paul Hewson's choice as
Bono for his stage name.
From the 1960s, the department store Boyers & Co. operated from North Earl Street. It closed in 2016, and was redeveloped as a
Sports Direct
Frasers Group plc (formerly known as Sports Direct International plc) is a British retail, sport and intellectual property group, named after its ownership of the department store chain House of Fraser. The company is best known for trading pre ...
. During this time the street was characterised as dominated by discount stores and euro shops and a decline in the condition of the street. This followed the closure of
Clerys
Clerys was a long-established department store on O'Connell Street in Dublin, Ireland, a focal point of the street. The business dates from 1853, however the current building dates from 1922, having been completely destroyed in the 1916 Eas ...
in 2015, which also faces onto North Earl Street and Earl Place. This site went under development as the Clerys Quarter in 2019.
These side entrances to the department store dated originally from 1979.
References
Citations
Sources
*
*
*
*
{{refend
Streets in Dublin (city)