Survey Data

Reg No

50920011


Rating

Regional


Categories of Special Interest

Architectural


Previous Name

James Supple


Original Use

Shop/retail outlet


In Use As

Restaurant


Date

1860 - 1870


Coordinates

315909, 233672


Date Recorded

22/09/2015


Date Updated

--/--/--


Description

Attached two-bay four-storey commercial building, built c. 1865, with replacement shopfront spanning ground floor. M-profile natural slate roof, hipped to north of rear (east) pile only and set behind parapet wall with limestone ashlar blocking course and coping. Parapet gutters, replacement plastic hopper and downpipe set in recess to north with outlets to blocking course and projections to limestone stringcourses of former rainwater goods. Red brick chimneystack with flush limestone courses and clay pots to west pile (south), profiled buff brick chimneystack with clay pots to east pile and further stack to north-east corner with decorative clay louvered pot. Red brick walls with cement pointing laid in Flemish bond with limestone ashlar stringcourses and flush platbands. Rendered walls to rear elevation (east). Decorative stepped and bowtelll moulded limestone ashlar window surrounds; square-headed to third floor with pointed headed limestone architrave rising from continuous stringcourse and gabled Portland limestone panel, shallow pointed headed openings to second floor with stepped voussoired flush head and continuous limestone sill course, and square-headed stepped shouldered openings to first floor with splayed sills and set in slight recess shared with second floor. Historic one-over-one timber sash windows. Square-headed window openings to rear with granite sills and one-over-one timber sash windows. Recent glazed shopfront with limestone cladding and original Portland limestone stiff-leaf cornice. Forming part of continuous terrace of commercial and formerly residential buildings lining east side of Grafton Street.

Appraisal

A purpose-built, vaguely Gothic style, commercial building reflecting the changing nature of Grafton Street at the turn of the nineteenth-century. The building retains the plot size of the former house on the site, in addition to a domestic fenestration pattern and roof form. Despite the loss of the original ground floor fabric, the building retains much of its original fabric. It makes a positive contribution to the varied character of the historic streetscape. The Dublin Builder records works by W.G Murray on the building in 1864, although Casey (2005) suggests that it looks 1870s.