Overview
The Italian Quarter is not a district – it is one pedestrian lane, Bloom Lane, behind the Jervis Centre and a few steps from the Liffey. It was built as a property development in 2004 by Mick Wallace, later a TD and MEP, who was fond enough of Italy to keep a vineyard in Piedmont, and the nickname stuck because he filled the lane with Italian businesses. Go for the food rather than the ‘quarter’: half an hour covers it – a coffee, a look at the mural, maybe a plate of pizza – and you have seen everything the name promises.
A modern development, and a real one across the river
Wallace designed the scheme with architect George Morris, keeping the old quay-side façade and cutting a new pedestrian route through the block; it opened in 2004 as Bloom Lane, with an apartment complex above called Quartiere Bloom. The name Italian Quarter caught on but has never been official – it is not recognised by Ireland’s placenames database or by Eircode.
It has also drifted from the idea. Wallace’s original company went bankrupt in 2016, and the first wave of Italian-themed shops – a barber, a clothes shop, a football shop – has gone, replaced by an eyebrow bar and a shisha lounge, so the lane is less Italian than it once was. What holds it together now is a handful of restaurants trading on quality rather than numbers.
Dublin’s actual Little Italy was elsewhere and earlier. From the 1840s to the 1930s an Italian community clustered around Ship Street, Chancery Lane and Werburgh Street, with marble workers, street musicians and fish-and-chip shops. Bloom Lane is a modern nod to that history, not its successor.
What to see and do
The food
The reason to come is the cluster of Italian kitchens, most of them more interested in doing one region properly than in pleasing everyone:
- Sfuso opened as a wine bar in 2003 and reinvented itself after Covid as a gastronomia – part deli, part wine bar. Its list is direct-trade wine bought straight from small Italian producers, and the counter carries cured meats, cheeses and pantry goods you will not find in a Dublin supermarket.
- Bar Italia, run by Roman David Izzo, calls itself Ireland’s first pinseria Romana, serving pinsa on dough fermented for 72 hours, alongside carbonara made with guanciale and fresh burrata.
- Caffè Cagliostro sits right beside the mural, and Wallace’s Taverna (2005) is the reliable pizzeria; it also has an accessible toilet.
The mural
John Byrne’s ‘Dublin’s Last Supper’ has filled the courtyard wall since the lane opened in 2004. The large photographic work restages Leonardo’s painting with a cross-section of contemporary Dubliners, made to reflect the city’s changing make-up at the turn of the millennium. It drew argument when it went up and has since become a fixture.
The walk
The lane is a small lesson in adaptive reuse: the kept stone façade of the old quay building against the sleek interiors behind it, and a pedestrian layout that slows the pace. It runs straight off the Millennium Walkway, so it works best as a pause on a riverside stroll rather than a stop in its own right.
Practical information
- Address: Bloom Lane, North City, Dublin 1, D01 V127.
- Getting there: on the Luas Red Line, get off at Jervis and walk south along the Millennium Walkway; from Temple Bar, cross the Millennium Bridge north onto the walkway and into the courtyard.
- Opening hours: the lane itself is open at all hours; the restaurants keep their own times, generally mid-morning until late. Check each venue for exact hours.
- Admission: free to walk the lane and see the mural.
- Accessibility: the lane is level and wheelchair-friendly, with curb-free access from the bridge; Wallace’s Taverna has an accessible toilet, though some interiors have steps.
- Parking: the Jervis Shopping Centre car park is next door; on-street parking on the quays is pay-and-display.
Nearby
- Temple Bar – across the Millennium Bridge, with cobbled streets, galleries and no shortage of pubs.
- Arran Quay – west along the river towards Smithfield, with views of the Liffey bridges.
- Jervis Shopping Centre – shops, a cinema and a multi-storey car park.
Come on a weekday evening if you want a table at Bar Italia or Sfuso, and treat the lane as a stop on a riverside walk rather than a destination – there is not enough here to fill an afternoon, but the pinsa and the espresso are the real thing.