The war memorial gardens
Every one of the 49,400 Irish soldiers who died in the First World War is named, by hand, in the illuminated manuscripts Harry Clarke’s studio made for the granite bookrooms here. That, not the bridge the district is named for, is the reason to come. The Irish National War Memorial Gardens are one of only four gardens Sir Edwin Lutyens designed in Ireland – the others are Heywood, Lambay Island and Howth Castle – and the only one built as a war memorial.
A memorial committee raised close to £50,000 by public appeal and secured a 25-acre site beside Phoenix Park; Lutyens, then chief architect to the Imperial War Graves Commission, was commissioned in 1929. The work was done by hand on purpose. British and Irish ex-servicemen moved the earth over two years without machinery, using granite from the Ballyknockan and Barnaculla quarries and stone cut by Irish masons. The garden runs symmetrically on a north–south axis around the central War Stone, with two fountains, sunken rose gardens, pergolas and four classical pavilions – the Bookrooms – for the four provinces.
The Bookrooms are the best thing here and the hardest to see: access is by arrangement only, so email the park manager at least a week ahead if you want the manuscripts opened. The Second World War delayed the formal opening and the gardens were let go in the 1960s; after a long OPW restoration, the memorial was finally dedicated on 10 September 1988 by representatives of the four main Irish churches. The OPW’s National Historic Properties runs them today with the National War Memorial Committee.
The bridge and the river
Island Bridge – the single ashlar arch the district is named for – has crossed the Liffey since 1793. Alexander Stevens the Elder built the 32-metre elliptical span to replace a 1577 crossing that a flood swept away in 1787. It opened as Sarah’s Bridge, after Sarah Fane, Countess of Westmorland, who laid the first stone on 22 June 1791; the Free State renamed it Island Bridge in 1922. From the 1730s, water drawn at Island Bridge was pumped over to the north side of the city by a ‘forcing engine’, an early link in Dublin’s water supply. Just downstream, the little River Camac slips out of a tunnel near Heuston Station to meet the Liffey.
A new pedestrian and cycle bridge, designed by John McLaughlin Architects, is planned nearby to connect the gardens with the north quays.
The old barracks
The barracks beside the bridge began as Island Bridge Barracks, home first to British artillery and, after independence, to the Irish Artillery Corps. It was renamed in 1942 for Peadar Clancy, killed during the War of Independence, and stayed in Defence Forces hands until it was sold in 2001 and largely redeveloped. Its outline can still be traced on old maps held by the National Archives.
Viking burials
Islandbridge sits on a 9th- and 10th-century Viking burial ground, dug near a point where the Liffey could be forded in the early medieval period – one of the earliest Norse footholds on the river. The graves aren’t open to the public, but weapons and ornaments recovered here are on display at the National Museum in Dublin City Centre.
Phoenix Park at the gate
Cross the bridge and the gardens open straight onto Phoenix Park, one of the largest walled city parks in Europe. Rowing clubs line this stretch of the Liffey, and the traffic-free Liffey towpath runs past the bridge – east toward the city centre, west into the park and its deer herd. Deeper in are the Victorian People’s Flower Gardens, Dublin Zoo, Áras an Uachtaráin and the Royal Hospital Kilmainham.
Getting there
The nearest Luas Red Line stop is Heuston, about a five-minute walk, and Dublin Bus routes along the South Circular Road stop within a few minutes of the bridge. By car, Island Bridge is on the South Circular Road with some on-street parking and a free car park next to the gardens – it fills quickly on fine weekends, so come early.
Opening hours and tours
The gardens open Monday to Friday from 8am and weekends from 10am, closing at dusk, and entry is free. Free guided tours run on Wednesdays at 2pm from April to October, covering Lutyens’ design and Clarke’s manuscripts, and the annual Remembrance service is held at the War Stone on 11 November. Time a visit for the roses in June, and email ahead if you want the Bookrooms opened – walking the gardens without seeing the manuscripts is missing the point of them.